The Hawk and his Handler
by charis2770
Summary: PLEASE read the note at the top of this story before reading the story itself, as some of my followers may be following me due to the fact that I mostly do NOT write slash, and that's what this story definitely is. No real angst, just some conflicted feelings that get worked out in interesting ways, between Clint and Phil
1. Chapter 1

_**This is quite probably the longest piece of porn without plot I've ever written. Ok, there's a little bit of plot. PLEASE NOTE: if you do not like slash, DO NOT read this story. I was compelled to write it because in spite of myself, I have read a number of VERY well-done fics about Barton/Coulson pairing, and the idea slowly wormed its way into my brain and wouldn't leave. I debated this, but in the end decided it fit just fine with the Hawkeye of my fics for him to be 1)totally open-minded about sex, 2)attracted to Phil but not enough to risk his relationship with Natasha 3)in need of a deeper level of submission than Tasha is able to give him, because that's not the way their relationship works. I furthermore decided that of all the people in my fics, Natasha is the only one who would not only be able to see this, but have enough self-confidence to let him experience this night with Phil without resentment. She knows without a doubt that he will come home to her, and she's just twisted enough herself to kind of find the thought of it titillating. I have NO idea whether I will expand upon this new development. As of now, it's just a one-off in my regular series, and you will not lose any of my main story hooks by not reading it if it does not appeal to you. Thank you all again for your kind words and encouragements!**_

He looks up only briefly when the door opens, not really acknowledging Tasha when she slides into the living room and throws her jacket over a chair. She's been in Tucson with Fury for the last couple of days, and he's missed her fiercely, but today's events have blunted all his feelings but a deep, aching sorrow. Tasha, being possibly the most observant person he knows, cannot help but notice his distinct lack of an enthusiastic welcome. Not being prone to wifely displays of concern (or anything else wifely either and would probably obliterate him if he ever even thought the M word), she comes to stand beside him where he's staring blindly out at a drizzly, cold, grey New York skyline without really seeing it.

"What's wrong, Barton?" She's not one to waste words either.

"Had a meeting with Phil," he admits reluctantly. Tasha goes very still, which tells him she'd probably known it was coming before he did.

"Okay," she says quietly, and waits. Once upon a time they'd have done some dance where he didn't want to talk about it, and she let him get away with that until he pissed her off with his moodiness and she smacked him around until he got over it or told her what was up. Mostly these days they just tell each other stuff, and save the smacking around for fun.

He sighs heavily, his whole body sagging a little.

"I've been reassigned, and so has he," he says bleakly.

"Well," she says carefully, "both of us have kind of become a little too public to be undercover SHIELD agents anymore. We're Avengers. Coulson's a handler."

"He's _my_ handler," whispers Clint, feeling bereft in a way he hasn't since Tasha flew off and left him standing in an abandoned orphanage.

"He's my handler too, Clint," Tasha reminds him. He looks sideways at her. It's different and she knows it. Maybe she's just playing devil's advocate.

"You'll miss him too," he says, though it's a little bit of a question.

She shrugs.

"Yes, a little. Not like you will though," she concedes his point for him before he has to make it. "I haven't been close to a handler in….well. Ever. I was taught not to have personal feelings for my handlers. Plus I've been working directly with Fury a lot more this past year. I like Phil, and I trust him, and I am grateful to him for trusting your judgment, but I don't love him. Not like you do."

Clint's eyebrows go up, and he swivels his head to look at her in surprise.

"Love him?"

She smiles briefly at him, a tiny quirk of her lips, and her hand steals down to twine in his own, which is a really surprising thing for her to do. Not that she never offers comfort, just that it's usually of a more carnal nature than this simple hand-holding. Tasha doesn't hold hands. She wants hers free to go for a weapon or a jugular vein at a moment's notice. She tugs gently, and he follows her to the sofa and sits at her urging. She sits beside him, legs thrown casually over his so that she's still touching him but it's not confining for either of them.

"Yes," she says seriously. "You've had a serious case of hero worship for Phil since before I met either of you."

He sighs a little, but this is true.

"He believed in me when no one else did," he agrees. "He trusted me, and he changed me from SHIELD's biggest liability to their biggest asset. Well, until we recruited you, that is." He grins at her. The grin is halfhearted, he knows, but not because the fact bothers him, only because he doesn't really feel like grinning.

"He didn't make you SHIELD's biggest asset," says Natasha. "You did. But I'm not belittling what he is to you. He helped you realize you could be, and that's almost the same thing."

"I get why this has to happen," he says softly, knowing there is real grief in his voice, and wondering why he is so close to actual tears. "I'm an Avenger now. We're….we're honest to God real fucking super heroes, which I still sometimes can't wrap my head around. We don't need handlers anymore. We're a team, and we're here to keep the monsters away when the world doesn't have anybody else to turn to. Goddamn, I sound like a fucking press release. But ok, yeah, that's what we are, and I get it. I do. Phil's a handler, probably the best one SHIELD's ever had, and he needs to do what he's good at. I didn't think this would hit me so hard is all."

"It's probably all the unrequited feelings going on," she says softly, and he can't respond. His mouth hangs open while he looks at her in disbelief.

"The what now?"

"You do know Phil's gay, right?" Natasha asks curiously.

"Yes, I've known for a long time. He told me not long after he got me assigned to him, wanted to clear the air and let me know it would never get in the way, but that he needed it out in the open in case I was going to have a problem with it. I didn't. I never did."

"No. But it has to be a little weird for you, to have feelings for him that are partly towards a father figure, which he obviously is, and partly attraction that you've never been able to express or act on."

He shoves her feet out of his lap and stands up, glaring down at her, affronted.

"What the fuck, Tasha?"

She looks up at him calmly.

"You heard what I said," she says, not flinching.

"Tasha, I'm not gay," he says, furious with her, not really able to stop and wonder why he's reacting quite so strongly. "If the past few months haven't demonstrated that clearly enough, I'll be glad to show you again, when I stop wanting to punch you in the mouth"

"If you punch me in the mouth, I'll break your arm," she says easily. "I know you're not gay, Barton. That's probably a big part of why this is so weird for you."

For quite a long time, he's too flabbergasted to even begin to formulate a response. Even when he starts to speak, it's pretty disjointed and confused.

"I….you….how can you…..why would you think…..Tasha! You're my lover."

"There's only one actual sentence in there, Clint," she points out matter-of-factly.

"Well yeah but it's a pretty fucking important sentence, Tash!"

She sighs, and stands up as well, walking away to go stare out the window herself, apparently because even now it's a little hard for her to comfortably look him in the eye while she says what she says next.

"It's fucking important to me too," she says quietly. "I guess you know I'm gone over your sorry ass. But Clint…if I love you, doesn't that mean I want you to be happy, even more than I want me to be happy?"

Despite the fact that he's outraged and speechless and conflicted as shit right now, he does still feel a kernel of warmth inside when she says she loves him, even in her roundabout way.

"Stop it," he snaps suddenly when he realizes what she's said there at the last. "You are not going to stand there and give me some bullshit speech about how you're setting me free to go be with Phil!"

She looks at him like he's crazy.

"No," she agrees readily. "I'll set you free probably about when we're both dead in a ditch somewhere. Asshat. You're mine, and I'm keeping you."

"Well. Good. Then what the fuck, Tasha?"

She threads her fingers through her hair and tugs in frustration.

"I am not good at this shit," she snarls, glaring at him. He holds his hands up.

"Don't blame me; you're the one who's talking crazy right now."

In typical fashion, which he has come to know and love, even though he almost always comes out on the losing end of it, she lashes out and knocks his feet out from under him, following him to the ground and sitting on his belly. Despite himself, he feels his dick twitch and start to stiffen. She notices, and instead of rolling her eyes, reaches back to grab hold of him through his fatigues, which finishes the job.

"Will you stop thinking with your brain for once and start thinking with your dick so I can make you get this?" she says, and this statement is so outrageous that he can't help but laugh. Her lips twitch, but she squeezes a little harder than is comfortable and he subsides.

"Obviously, you've got me at your mercy. What is it I'm supposed to be getting?"

"Are you homophobic, Clint?"

"Of course not. You know that. Half the people I grew up with in the circus were pretty much gender blind and took their lovers from either side. Sometimes both at once."

"But you didn't." This is a statement, rather than a question. She knows he's never had a sexual encounter with another guy.

"No. It just….didn't fall out that way, I guess."

"Are you dead set against the idea of ever letting a man put his hands on you?" she asks, and she actually seems curious. This conversation is probably the strangest one he's ever had.

"I am _now_," he says with a slight leer up at her. "My girlfriend would geld me if I looked at anyone else."

"Will you stop being literal and answer me?" She's starting to act annoyed, and since her hand is still on his twitching cock, he decides he'd better cooperate.

"Where you're going with this is freaking me out a little, but okay. No, I was never dead set against it. Once or twice there was a guy who made me consider it, for a little while, but I just never met a dude who did it for me that way."

"Until Phil," she says ruthlessly. He glares at her. This again.

"Phil's my handler, and my friend," he says stiffly. "He's a professional, and we like and respect each other. I'm with YOU, Tasha. This is stupid."

"Do you realize that you haven't actually said you're NOT attracted to him?"

He goes quiet for a minute, because it's true. This is not a conversation he's ever thought he'd have with anyone, including himself. She squeezes again, more gently, and he can't help that his hips arch up towards her a little. He can't understand why she's talking about this, with evidence of his complete attraction to her throbbing in her hand. He also wishes he wasn't wearing pants.

"You dream sometimes," she says ruthlessly, and he feels a flush staining his cheeks before she even continues the thought, because he knows what she's going to say, he just hadn't known she knew about it. "You don't talk in your sleep much, but I've heard you say his name once or twice. And it wasn't a nightmare you were having, Clint. "

"Jesus, Natasha," he mutters, looking away from her. She sighs again.

"I'm trying to make this easy for you, Barton, and you keep getting in the way."

"Easy for me? It sounds fuck-all like you're trying to throw me at another man, and I don't know where the hell that's coming from, because I'm fucking HAPPY with you, Tasha. I don't want to be anywhere else."

"Barton, you're a moron," she says disgustedly.

"You are the only woman on the face of the planet who would call her lover a moron for insisting on being faithful to her."

"A moron," she continues resolutely. "And it's usually you who sees things more clearly than I do. Jesus Clint, it's not like you could call our relationship conventional in any way."

"No, but that doesn't make us swingers!"

She snorts with laughter at this, and he's briefly transported by the image of Tasha in what he imagines a swingers' club to be like, sending prospective partners fleeing in abject terror just by looking at them, until they're the only two people left in the entire building.

"God forbid," she murmurs to herself, then abruptly lets go of his dick and sits back (which doesn't help at all because now her absolutely perfect ass is pressing against his erection, which is nowhere near as confused as he is. She puts her hands on her hips, ignoring this, and glares at him. "Why did it scare you when I fucked you, Clint?" she asks suddenly. His flush deepens, because talking about what is absolutely the most naked moment of his entire life is a little sensitive, even though he's grateful to her for it. And even though, if he's honest, the memory of it still wakes him trembling with need and on the verge of spilling all over his sheets like an adolescent boy. They haven't done it again since then. It was too raw, too heartrending, to duplicate. Probably. He's honestly not sure how to answer her question.

"I…hell, Tash, I don't know. I'd never done it before, you'd already hurt me a lot, and I figured it was going to hurt even more."

She looks at him thoughtfully.

"I don't think that's really why," she muses. He thinks she might be right.

"I guess I've never thought about why it scared me so much. I was pretty fucked up at the time, and you'd already broken me." He may not always be able to express what he's thinking, but it isn't because he can't be honest with her.

"That's not really right either," she goes on. She isn't mad anymore, she's earnest, and that's still weirding him out. A lot. "I didn't really break you til I fucked you."

Jesus. But she's right.

"Okay, I guess that's true."

"When I asked you then if you loved it, and you said yes, were you lying?"

They've just come way too far together for him to flinch away from this now.

"No," he admits. "Wasn't lying. It scared me, ripped out my bleeding fuckin heart and blasted me to pieces….but….oh hell. I didn't just like it."

"No," she says with a small smile, and since it's a slightly lascivious one, he's relieved to know the memory doesn't freak her out either. She grows very solemn then. "I need to ask you to be as honest with me now as you were that day, when you were stripped down to nothing. Can you?"

"I can try," he says, uncomfortably, because he's pretty sure they're back to the Phil thing again.

"DO you dream about him? That way, I mean?"

"I'm going to answer you, Tash, but Jesus, do you get why this is really freaking me out?"

"Yeah, but that's stupid." She sighs, and rolls her eyes, and seems to steel herself for something she finds difficult. She looks steadily into his eyes. "Clint. If I had a problem with this, do you really think I'd be putting you through it? It's fine. I'm fine. We're fine. We're going to keep being fine. Okay?"

"Okay," he sighs, and steels himself to be honest, hoping he's not screwing up the best thing that's ever happened to him. "Yeah. I have dreams sometimes. They freak me out when I wake up, but not…during. But Tash, that doesn't mean I'm not happy with you, or satisfied."

"Dumbass," she says comfortably. "I know that. If you feel obligated to say it again, I'll hurt you. In a bad way."

He supposes he should be thankful he's done something right enough up until now that she is this comfortable with a subject this treacherous.

"Point taken," he assures her quickly, before she decides to make good on the threat. "So okay. Yeah, it's not something I've ever wanted to think a lot about, you know? I've known you were it for me for a long time. This…thing, I guess you can call it a fantasy…it sort of blindsided me when I had the dream the first time, about three years ago."

She raises her eyebrows a little.

"Three years? You've had a boner for Coulson for three years and never said anything? Barton, you're the least sexually repressed person I know! Why didn't you ever tell him?"

"Jesus, Tasha. I may be an irreverent, smartassed fuckup with a problem with authority, but I respect Phil. If I know nothing else about him, I know that if I'd done any such thing, he'd have been horrified. Even if by some totally bizarre twist of fate he had the same weird thoughts about me, he would never act on them, and would have withdrawn himself as my handler if I'd gone there."

She thinks about this for a minute.

"Ok yeah, you're right. I'm not sure why you think it would be a bizarre twist of fate for him to have the same kind of boner for you, but you're right that he'd refuse to act on it."

"I'm not his type, that's why," he says, a little ruefully. "Phil's a pretty classy guy, with his suits and ties, and his unshakable calm, and his high class tastes. I'd be like…slumming…for him."

The look she sends him then is vile, and promises dire retribution.

"That what you think I'm doing?" she purrs dangerously.

"No. Jesus. A lot of days I'm not sure what the fuck you're doing here, but I'm damned grateful for it."

"Asshat," she sighs comfortably. "What's the dream about?"

"Fuck, Natasha, I don't think I can talk about that to you. This whole thing is weird, but that's just TOO weird."

"Seriously, there's a reason I'm asking. I want to know if I'm right about something. You don't have to give me details, though if you ever decide to, I gotta tell you I think it kind of turns me on to think about it, but okay. I mean…will you tell me just…kind of the circumstances?"

Turns her on? He blinks slowly at her in surprise. Ohhhhkay then.

"Um…it's just….shit, this is strange. People don't talk to their lovers about prurient dreams they have about another person."

"Yeah," she agrees sarcastically. "God knows we do everything just like normal people."

"Point taken." He squirms a little, uncomfortably, then closes his eyes because he's not ready to see the reaction on her face, and dives in. "Circumstances. Okay. I'm….he's…forceful. He takes; he doesn't give me a choice. I feel like…I keep thinking that I hope I'm pleasing him. There's this feeling of….like, surrender, I guess? It makes me feel safe. Weird, huh?"

"Not particularly. You have a strong submissive streak, and we're too equal to really feed it very often."

"I love switching with you, Tash," he protests, realizing as he does so that his protests are starting to sound a little thin.

"Me too. It's not quite the same, though. Clint, please listen to me. Coulson's not your handler anymore. He'll be heading back to the west coast soon. Believe me when I say he definitely returns the attraction. I think you need this, both of you, or it's going to eat at you for the rest of your lives. I know it doesn't mean you want me less, or him more. There is room in a lot of people's hearts for more than one person. I think you're one of them. And it doesn't bother me. If you decide to leave me for him, I'll kill you both, but I trust you, trust US enough that I'm not jealous or worried. To be honest, I kind of hope it goes well, because if it does, sometime I want to watch."

"You hope what goes well?"

"You seducing Phil before it's too late."

There are a lot more words, protests, reasons, and arguments. At the end, he's left with a split lip and the immensely confusing reality that he's promised his girlfriend he'll try to have sex with another man tonight.

The security on Coulson's rooms is very good, but doesn't extend to the air vents in the ceiling. If he was any bigger, there'd be a good chance nobody'd know he was stuck up there until maintenance got sent to track down the smell. But he's not, so he spends his evening alternately trying to relax in and pacing nervously up and down Coulson's living room. Coulson has an apartment in the city, but Clint knows he's been staying here since the Chitauri invasion. Or, well, since he came back to them shortly afterwards. Clint still doesn't think a lot about that day. If Coulson had stayed dead….

But he hadn't.

The rooms are tidy, with no extraneous clutter. The walls are painted a soft, misty gray color. Tasteful prints along with black and white photography are hung in aesthetically pleasing locations. The furniture is masculine but elegant, leather and dark gleaming woods. The dinette is walnut, and only big enough for two, though it is currently set for one. Seems like Phil, to lay out things in preparation for dinner when he gets home, even if he's been out all day. The single plate, wine glass, and silver flatware make Clint feel lonely. He wonders if Phil ever feels that way, or if his mind has no room for anything but the job like it appears to. Hell, Phil may have a dozen lovers, for all he knows. He realizes with a pang that he doesn't know a lot about Coulson's personal life. Shouldn't he have asked more often, if he was really Phil's friend? Jesus, the handler probably thinks he's a self-centered asshole! What the fuck is he even doing here? If Phil doesn't laugh at him, he's going to get pissed and throw him out!

He's making his way into the hall where the loose vent cover is located, intending to leave the way he came and forget this entire insane idea, but he's too late. Behind him, there's a series of clicks and the door opens. The apartment is very dim, with only one small lamp providing light, so Coulson's body is momentarily silhouetted black against the brighter light of the hallway. Clint freezes, and sees Phil do the same. Knowing that they are both trained in what to do when they surprise an intruder, he moves into the oasis of light cast by the lamp so that he can be seen more clearly, making sure his hands can be seen, empty and held slightly away from his body.

"It's me," he says quickly, before Phil can draw the gun he knows is hidden under the tailored suit jacket, even though it can't be seen. Phil relaxes, and enters his rooms, closing the door behind him.

"What a pleasant surprise, Agent Barton," he says, and Clint thinks he's probably the only one who can hear the wry sarcasm in it. Everybody thinks Phil has no sense of humor. "Though why you chose to avail yourself of my hospitality without say, waiting until I was home and _knocking_, I'm not entirely sure. Perhaps you'd care to enlighten me?"

Clint hunches his shoulders up around his ears and wonders what the fuck he's supposed to say.

"Hi Phil, welcome home, how'd you like to fuck me?" or "Nice to see you Coulson, now whaddya say we get freaky?" or "Feeling up to some farewell nookie, buttercup?" Clint's brain tends to grow more and more perverse the more uncomfortable he is. This is off the scale. He feels frozen, and his mind is a reeling turmoil of not knowing what the hell he's doing.

"Tasha sent me," he manages, and realizes that wasn't an enlightening choice at all. Shit, probably it would have helped if he'd….lit candles, started up some mood music (what would Coulson consider mood music anyway? Opera? Mozart? Barry White? God, he hopes it's not Barry White), fixed dinner….something. Probably. Instead he just stands there with his hands still held out from his sides, still trying to look nonthreatening. Phil raises one eyebrow and moves further into the room, placing a set of keys and his SHIELD badge and wallet in a brushed-silver bowl on a small table by the door.

"Did Tasha have a reason, or is this some obscure Russian traditional thing our research department has never heard of?" Colson straightens his sleeves a little and goes to a dark cherrywood cabinet, where he retrieves a heavy crystal snifter and pours himself a drink. Scotch, Clint knows, Macallan 50 year old single malt. Clint hates the stuff, but Coulson's a connoisseur. Suddenly he realizes he's being stupid and he really does know a lot about Phil. He knows the crystal in Coulson's hand is Lalique, as are the two gleaming crystal sculptures set on recessed pedestals on either side of the leather sofa, both nude dancers frozen forever in impossible positions, so beautifully rendered that you can almost see the faint tremble in muscles that strain to hold that perfect pose. He knows that Phil's suit is Armani, his perfectly shined loafers are Gucci, his watch is Breguet. When in New York, he dines once a month at Eleven Madison Park. He holds season tickets at the Met, and prefers classic or impressionist paintings to modern or cubist forms. He likes dogs but doesn't care for cats. He's allergic to bee stings and carries and epi pen in a neat leather case in his inside coat pocket, along with a garrote and an extra mag for his sig. He doesn't have much time to read for fun, but loves Stephen King and is secretly a Harry Potter fan. He loves French cuisine, sushi, and Italian ices from street vendors. He has a secret weakness for Sabratt's hot dogs. He swims every morning he's able, and can almost keep up with Clint at a flat run, though admittedly this is partly because he's taller and his legs are longer. He has a huge collection of old comic books and cards (of which the now-bloodstained Captain America cards are STILL his prized possessions, though he's coldly informed Fury that he has six months to find replacements. Clint doesn't know what happens at the end of six months if Fury fails to come through, but he'd kill to find out.)

While realizing all this makes him feel a little less out of place in Phil's living room, it doesn't do a damn thing for helping him figure out what the fuck to SAY to the man. He's no silver-tongued sophisticate, and he's never trolled for boys in a gay bar and doesn't have a clue as to the lingo. He never finished high school, and can't tell a Rembrandt from a Picasso. He's a lot better at actions than words.

Well then. What the fuck.

Taking a deep breath, he crosses to Phil in a few quick strides, and before the handler can realize what he's about, plucks the scotch from his hand, downs it in one gulp even though he finds it foul, and kisses Phil right on the mouth. As Phil's belatedly reacting by rearing his head back in shock, it isn't a terribly successful kiss, and their teeth clash. Clint tries to put his hands on Coulson's waist, but Phil grabs both his wrists and does a little twist and shove at the same time until Clint finds himself slammed up against the wall with Phil glaring furiously at him, his cheeks stained red, breathing hard. His shirt is still buttoned all the way up, his silk tie still neatly knotted, every hair still in place, but the expression on his face is far from composed. Clint finds this distressing. He also finds it distressing that Coulson was able to get the upper hand on him this easily, but chalks it up to uncertainty and nerves making him clumsy.

"What the HELL do you think you're doing, Agent Barton?" hisses Coulson. He sounds really pissed. Clint suddenly realizes it's quite possible Tasha has mistaken the signs of Phil's attraction to him, and that he has made an enormous mistake.

"I'm your goodbye present. Don't you wanna come over here and unwrap me?" he says coyly, and feels like an idiot for saying it, but he's starting to be horribly embarrassed and instead of letting it show, he goes for casually flippant. Phil's hands on his wrists grind hard against bone and he swallows a moan, hoping to just be able to get out of here in one piece.

"Are you insane?" asks Phil, still outraged. "Agent Romanoff would never forgive this kind of betrayal, and neither would I. I am not in need of your pity, Agent Barton, and I'll thank you to leave my apartment at once before this farce goes too far!"

Well ouch. That stings a little. Seems he's right after all, and he's not up to Coulson's standards.

"Tasha _sent_ me," he says, and feels stupid that his voice sounds a little sullen. "I already told you that. I don't need your pity either, and I'll get the fuck out of your hair if you'll LET THE FUCK GO OF MY ARMS!"

Phil does not let go. His grip on Clint's wrists is viselike, and Clint concentrates hard on not liking it.

"Explain yourself. Now."

That tone of voice, commanding, uncompromising, sends a bolt of electricity straight through Clint's belly. He realizes he's loved the way Phil gives orders for years, and that okay, the reason their relationship as spy and handler has worked so well for him is that Phil makes him feel like obeying him. He draws a shuddering breath, because when Phil snaps orders like that, he is unable to do anything but comply.

"She did, Sir," he says softly, falling easily into the subordinate role. "She says that if I don't…find out what this thing is….that she says I feel about you….before it's too late, that I'll regret it forever."

Coulson closes his eyes briefly, as though praying for patience or trying to think of a way to let him down easy, Clint imagines. When he opens them again, Clint is startled to see heat in them.

"And what do you say, Agent Barton?" he asks softly. Clint sighs, and twists his wrists a little in Coulson's grasp because he knows it will make his handler grip them tighter and when he does, Clint can answer him. He can't, however, quite bring himself to meet Coulson's gaze when he does it.

"I say she's right, Sir," he whispers.

Abruptly, Phil lets go of him and turns away. Feeling a little bereft, Clint stays where he is, leaning against the wall for support and wondering if he could just sink through the floor. Coulson pulls his cell phone out of his pants pocket, presses a button, and brings it to his ear. There's a brief pause, then he speaks. His voice is cold as ice.

"Are you insane?" he demands frostily, then is silent for quite some time, while the person on the other end of the line, presumably Natasha, speaks. After several minutes, and without saying another word, he disconnects the call and tosses his phone onto the bar at Clint's side. Clint watches it slide on the silky marble top, wondering if it'll slide off the other side. It doesn't, but it teeters dangerously on the edge. It's a mistake to take his gaze off Coulson though, because he suddenly finds himself slammed hard against the wall again, and this time he hits his head a solid thunk when Coulson's forearm connects with his throat and forces his head up and back. His eyelids flutter and he's unable to silence a tiny sound, not even quite a whimper.

"Listen to me very carefully, Barton," says Phil tightly. Clint tries to nod, but can't. "This is by far the most ridiculous thing you've ever done in a long history of ridiculous choices. I have no idea what has made the two of you come up with this harebrained scheme, but it is not appreciated."

Clint feels about two inches tall, and knows his ears are red with embarrassment.

"I'm sorry Sir. I told her I wasn't your type. She thinks if I….if we….ah. Then maybe I'll stop having the dream and not wish….well. Never mind. I really am sorry. If you'd…uh…let go, Sir, I'll just…leave now."

Yep. Leave now, go dig a very deep hole, climb in it, and never come out. Well, maybe several months after Coulson goes back to the West coast, he'll think about it. Tasha's radar has never been this far off before. This is quite possibly the worst night of his life. Coulson's forearm, which is deceptively slim for someone who is actually as strong as the handler, presses harder against his windpipe, cutting off his air a little bit. This time the sound he makes is undeniably a whimper, and he hates himself for it, for what it reveals. Coulson's furious gaze darkens even more.

"What. Dream." He grits out, almost spitting the words in Clint's face.

"The one where we….where you….and….where we're doing….this, Sir. Only," whispers Clint miserably, "In the dream….you want to."

Coulson closes his eyes briefly and points his face at the ceiling, as if he's praying for patience.

"Why are you doing this, Agent," he asks very softly, a dangerous edge in his voice that Clint has only heard twice before, and both times it was after he'd gotten hurt on a mission. The voice will brook no protest, and demands truth, clear and simple.

"Because I want to," whispers Clint, simply. Coulson inhales sharply and his head jolts back a little in surprise. He is silent for some time, staring at Clint, who is unable to stop himself from fidgeting a little under the scrutiny. Jesus, Coulson always makes him feel like a kid, and this time it's worse than ever. Which is also disturbingly arousing. Or would be, if Clint wasn't mortally humiliated right now.

"I am going to say some things to you, Agent Barton," he says, enunciating each word carefully. "I want you to listen closely to them, and not interrupt me. When I am finished, I am going to ask you a very important question, which you will answer truthfully. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes Sir," gasps Clint, who is still having a little trouble breathing, or it could just be that Coulson's making him dizzy. At the honorific, Coulson makes a sound in the back of his throat that is nearly a snarl. Clint wants to reach up and loosen his tie and put his mouth on the place on Phil's throat that his collar and tie are currently concealing. He feels this is probably an inappropriate response just at the moment.

"I have been your handler for four years, Agent Barton," begins Phil. His voice is calm now, but the arm against Clint's neck is trembling a little. "Four years, and we have worked well together. I have found it an honor and a privilege to be your handler, and had considered you my friend as well. I have watched you grow from a cocky, rude, disrespectful liability into an agent and a man anyone would be proud to know. I have trusted you, and been trusted in return. We have not always agreed, but we have treated one another with respect, or we had until tonight. I have worked very hard to make sure that my personal preferences and choices never crossed over into our working relationship, because to allow that to happen would have been unprofessional and inexcusable. There is also the fact that I have seen how you looked at agent Romanov from the day you brought her to me, unconscious rather than dead as expected. I have known all along that while my…tastes….did not offend you, you very clearly did not share them. I have been quite careful to make sure that you never," and here his arm presses down sharply and Clint wheezes a little, "NEVER had a single inkling that I found you attractive. I have a great deal of difficulty believing you would mock that, had you become aware of it by some miracle, so I am trying not to be mortally offended by your insolent offer regarding goodbye presents, but it is not easy. I can't do this, Clint. I can't take what you're offering, knowing it isn't what you really want, when you're this ridiculously gorgeous, inexperienced, beautiful boy I have thought of so often and so indecently it makes me feel ashamed, knowing I might hurt or distress you, that I would ruin something that should be a dream come true because I can't help myself. It isn't fair, Agent. So do not dare stand there and offer me the moon when all you have to truly give is lip service. I am well aware that you're not gay, and what you're offering me is…well…it's so tempting that I am not man enough to refuse it more than once. I was prepared to brush this off as some absurdly misguided scheme my two protégées cooked up as a farewell gift, which would have been insulting, but then you had to go and mention dreams. I am not strong enough to refuse again, Clint, because I have to tell you that I want this. Badly. I am giving you one chance. One. Be very careful how you answer, because I'm not going to be able to stop if you let me get started. Do you understand that?"

Clint, who has been listening with growing astonishment, nods as best he can while being asphyxiated.

"Very well. This is the question. What. Do. You. Want?"

The forearm eases back enough for Clint to gasp in a huge lungful of air. The combination of being forcibly restrained, the clean leather scent of Phil's cologne, and the things the handler has just confessed to him have all combined to give him a raging hard-on. He licks his lips nervously, sees Coulson's eyes follow its nervous sweep across his lips and wants to moan. He closes his eyes, prays for courage, and answers.

"I want you," he breathes.

"What?" asks Coulson, his arm dropping abruptly as he steps back in shock, this clearly NOT being the answer he was expecting. Emboldened, Clint raises his eyes to stare into the wide shocked expression on Phil's face.

"I want you, Sir," he repeats. Coulson's eyelids drop. "You like that, don't you? The Sir? Yeah, I like saying it. Sir," he whispers. "I want this. I want you. I want you…." He leans forward, until his face is next to Phil's, and breathes into his ear, "to _fuck _me." He's back on ground he understand now, oh yes, and it turns out slumming is Phil's style after all. His handler's hand flashes up and fists in his shirt, and he's shoved against the wall for the third time tonight, not minding a bit this time, nossir. Coulson leans close, and Clint breathes him in, and shivers, because while he's acting a little cocky now, he's still nervous as hell. Coulson's voice in his ear is a snarl, and he feels it in his spine.

"You'd better be very sure what you're asking for, little boy," he hisses, and Clint groans, because _fuck_ that's what Phil calls him in the dream. Coulson reacts to the groan by crowding his body up against the archer, and when Clint feels the older man's groin press into his, and his rather impressive erection hot against the inside of his thigh, he feels a little dizzy. "Like that, is it?" he murmurs with some amusement. Clint tugs at the perfectly knotted tie, pulls it free, pinches open the top button of Phil's perfectly pressed dress shirt. He does what he's wanted to do for what seems like hours now, pressing his mouth to the hollow of Phil's throat, his teeth scraping skin while he answers, breathless and still a little scared, stumbling a little over his words as he answers.

"Is it….any wonder, Sir? Guy who…ah…raised me….tied me to a wheel and threw knives at me. I was into bondage before I hit puberty. Then I was…SHIELD's worst behavior problem….until you saved me, showed me….Jesus you smell good…what I could be. Is it really any wonder I got a little bit of daddy kink going on?"

The hand Phil doesn't have clenched in Clint's shirt slides up to fist in his hair, which Clint is, not for the first time cause Tasha's a puller too, very thankful he has let grow out some from its usual short, near-military crop.

"Bondage hm?" says Phil speculatively. "You know Agent, boys who ask to be tied up should really be very careful what they ask for."

Fuuuuuckkkk. He's so screwed. In the dream, Phil is rough with him, and that's enough, but this…this dark silky menace in his voice, is startling because he'd have never pegged Phil for this, with his proper manners and his perfect composure and impeccable grooming, and Jesus Christ if it's true, if Phil is as sick a bastard as he himself, or even anywhere near the same zipcode (cause face it, he thinks, that's pretty damn sick), he's not sure he's going to survive it. He whines a little when Phil yanks his head back roughly and kisses him. It's so different than kissing a woman, to feel another face rough with stubble against his own, the hard line of masculine jaw instead of a soft feminine cheek, lips and teeth and tongue the same as his. Yeah, weird, but shit, it's hot too, and he's starting to feel a lot less nervous.

"You have no idea what you're offering, little boy," murmurs Coulson warningly, pulling back a little, his chest rising and falling heavily as he looks at Clint through hooded eyes.

"Jesus. Fuck. Show me Sir," he gasps. Coulson groans a little and the hand in his hair gentles, strokes the curve of his skull. Clint leans into the caress, sighing.

"You have no idea what you're asking. No, Barton, not your first time. It would….it would bring out some aggressive tendencies in me that would be an unfortunate mix for you, since you've never done this before."

"Have," mutters Clint, turning his head to press teeth to Coulson's wrist where his pulse pounds, thick and heavy. He's almost certain Phil swears softly under his breath.

"I know for a fact it was only a couple of months before Loki…." Coulson hesitates a second, then plows ahead, skimming over the name like it's nothing, and that's good, that's fine, Clint doesn't want to think about him tonight anyway, "that you'd imbibed a truly astonishing volume of tequila and wanted to ask me what it was like being gay, during which very odd conversation you told me you had never been with a man. Either you worked pretty quickly after that or….are you telling me that Loki…." He trails off, looking horrified. "Oh Clint…."

"No," Clint hurries to reassure him, because this dawning horror, this sorrow he sees trying to bloom on Phil's face, is NOT what he wants from him right now. "No, definitely no, that's not what I mean. And yeah, I mean no, I've still never been with a guy. I mean…" Clint realizes what he's saying and blushes, because he's never told anybody this. Oh what the hell, anything to take that look off Coulson's face. "It was Tasha," he says in a rush, and buries his face in Phil's shirt, feeling like he's about twelve again and admitting he's had his first wet dream. He has no idea why he's acting this way. It isn't like him. But shit, when Phil calls him little boy, he just sinks into it like quicksand and he's there, and it's still a little scary but it's like warm sunlight on a part of him that's only ever lived in darkness, and he's going to try not to examine it too closely.

Then Phil's hand clenches again in his hair and he sighs happily as Phil chuckles a little.

"I see. Still, that doesn't mean you're….accustomed….to this. I don't want to hurt you, Clint."

Clint stares at his face, sees both the hunger and the lie written there.

"Yes, you do," he says, and then, recklessly, foolishly, "and I want you to." Phil's grip turns brutal, tight enough to make his eyes water, and Clint does the only thing he can think to do under the circumstances. There's no foolish pride in him. Plenty of pride, yeah, and god knows he's one of the hardest-headed sons of bitches he's ever known, but since Tasha came into his life, he knows that letting pride get in the way of what you want is just stupid. If he's doing this, and apparently he is, then he's damn well going all out. He slides gracefully to his knees, knowing he does it well because being in tune with his body has never been one of his weak points. Coulson likes it. Oh, he does. Clint blushes and lowers his eyes at the flare of dark shine in Phil's eyes. He has no idea what's gotten into him, why he's behaving so recklessly when he truly doesn't know what the consequences may be, but the feelings from the dream are taking him over, and he wants. Oh, he wants. He wants Phil to be pleased with him, to see the smile of pride he finds so rewarding after a mission accomplished on Phil's face for a much dirtier reason. He wants Phil to pet him and tell him he's a good boy. He wants to make Phil happy, to erase the lines of pain and stress he sometimes sees in the older man's face. He comes close to feeling this way with Tasha, sometimes. But she is right when she says they are too equal to really feed the part of him that wants to kneel at another's feet and give himself to them, to serve them and feel the surge of pride and peace that comes when you are owned, and it is good, and the one who owns you tells you that you've done well. He knows where these feelings come from, remembers being an anxious, messed up young kid with a little talent, and trying so hard to master the tasks the Marksman taught him, how patient he had been and yet how tough. He remembers the brush of a callused hand over his head, the touch fleeting and affectionate, and the voice rough with years of tobacco use musing, "Not bad, boy. Not bad." He'd lived for those moments. He remembers the clench in his gut when he'd gotten caught breaking curfew and making out with the ringmaster's daughter INSIDE the off-limits runs where the big cats were housed, and the hiss of his mentor's belt as it slid through the loops. He remembers the sting of it, and how he'd tried not to cry but had anyway, and the rough awkward hug after and the gruff, "All right now, boy. It's forgotten." And it was. Oh yeah, he knows why he feels this way, and he knows why he feels this way for Phil, and now that he does know, all he can think about is that Phil will be gone soon and he wants this to be _perfect_. He looks up at Phil's face, and his breath catches a little in his throat at the smile on Phil's face.

"Do you…" he asks hesitantly, because he's not sure how to be cool about it when he doesn't feel cool at all, he feels nervous and inexperienced and foolish, but god damn, he's gonna try. "Would you like me to…go down on you, Sir?" He's pretty much eye to…hem….eye, with Phil's evident arousal. There's even a tiny spot of damp blackening the dark grey of Phil's trousers. Fuck. He has no idea how to do this, and it never would have occurred to him to actually ask Tasha for pointers, but what the hell. Maybe Phil won't expect too much. Phil, in response to his question, looks at the ceiling again and sucks in a huge, shuddering breath.

"You have no idea, son," he says with a slightly rueful smile. But then he's tugging Clint to his feet and towards the bedroom. "But that might be a little….overwhelming, and uncomfortable for you. I have dreamed about a night like this for too long to let anything spoil it, for you or me. If it isn't…good for you, it's not going to be good for me either. And Clint, I _can_ make it good for you."

"You don't have to be gentle with me, Sir," says Clint, feeling rather anxious, because no, that's not what he wants from Phil. The reassuringly predatory smile Phil shoots at him sends a thrill through his body.

"I didn't say I wouldn't hurt you, little boy," says Phil quietly, and his voice is gentle and menacing at the same time. "I said I'd make it good for you."

"Yes Sir," says Hawkeye faintly, and lets himself be towed into Phil's bedroom. Jesus, he thinks, mind going blank for a second, I'm in Phil's bedroom. I'm in PHIL'S bedroom. I'm in Phil's BEDROOM. He freezes for a moment, but Phil's grip on his arm is steely, and he has to follow or fight back, and he really doesn't want to fight back. At the edge of the bed, which is wide and covered with a blue and green spread, and bound at the head and foot by a heavy cherry frame.

"Looks sturdy," he says, knowing it sounds inane, but he's having mental images of Phil tying him to it and….Oh god, he's really lost his mind. Phil's mouth quirks in a smile.

"It is. Strip."

"Sir?"

"I said," breathes Phil, stepping so close Clint can feel the heat of his body through both their clothes, "Clinton Francis Barton, take your clothes off. Obey me. Now."

Well fuck, since he's put it that way. Clint wonders briefly if he's going to come in his pants like a kid before he can get them off, but he manages not to, and to slither out of his clothes. He hopes he doesn't look as awkward and ungainly as he feels, because his hands are shaking a little, but Phil's looking at him like he's candy, so he thinks maybe he's okay. When he is naked, though Phil is still fully clothed, Coulson pushes him gently backwards onto the bed. The archer scrambles to arrange himself in some semblance of a normal pose on top of the soft comforter. Coulson smiles down at him for just a moment, and then Clint blinks in surprise as the older man is sort of just suddenly there, on his hands and knees above him, his body framing the younger man's, looking down at him with what can only be described as a feral grin. Clint doesn't think he's ever seen Coulson grin before. He shivers.

"Put your hands above you on the headboard," Phil orders, and the tone in his voice is calm, though he is still breathing hard. Hawkeye gropes above his head until he finds the sturdy crosspiece of the headboard. He wraps his hands around it and squeezes hard. "Good boy," whispers Phil, and these words are very nearly Clint's undoing, because he's dreamed them before, but never heard them for real. He knows it's sick, and he doesn't care. "Now, don't move them until I tell you that you may. Can you do that for me?"

"Yes Sir," gasps Clint, and oh Jesus, oh Fuck, if Coulson will only keep talking to him like that, he'll do anything he wants. His hips buck upwards towards the other man, he can't help it, and his cry of shock is really just that, when Phil's palm connects with his thigh with a sharp slap. It doesn't really hurt, not compared to a lot of the things he and Tasha have done, but it's _Phil_ slapping him and it goes beyond even what he's dreamed about, and shocks him. Coulson leans down and kisses him again then, and it's still strange, but only because the sensation of it is different than anything he's experienced before, not because he doesn't like it. Phil's fingertips on his jaw hold his head still and he hums a soft, contented sound into Phil's mouth, making the handler laugh.

"Good god, Barton," he says with a slightly silly smile. "If I'd known you'd be this eager, I'd have gotten reassigned a long time ago."

"If I'd known I'd be this eager," pants Clint into his impending lover's mouth, "I'd have asked you to."

"No regrets though?" Coulson asks, and it's kind of weird to think Phil might actually be wanting reassurance.

"None Sir. I wouldn't be where I am without you. And this…well, we're here now. Guess I wouldn't really want to change the other, cause I'm not sure I'd even be alive today if I hadn't been assigned to you."

"It wasn't random, you know," smiles Phil, and nips Clint sharply on the bottom lip, causing Clint's hips to roll helplessly towards him again and gaining him another stinging slap on the inner thigh. Coulson continues as though none of this has occurred. "I requested you, you know."

"Y…you did? _Why?_ I was a total fuckup then!"

Phil's fingers on his throat and jaw are gentle, and Clint shivers.

"No, just lost," he says with another warm smile that makes the archer feel a little gooey inside, and aint that a hell of a thing? "I saw excellence in you, beyond all the attitude problems and insubordination reprimands in your file."

"Not sure why you put up with me," he gasps, as Coulson's fingers drift through his hair and tug gently.

"Does it make me a terrible person to admit I fantasized about spanking you black and blue a great many times that first year?"

Clint closes his eyes, momentarily transported by this mental image, and moans softly, unable to help it. Coulson chuckles.

"Oh….only the first year, Sir?"

"After the first year I fantasized about it for entirely different and unprofessional reasons."

"Fuck, Sir. Do you….do you wanna? Now?"

Phil pauses for a second in his soft caresses of Clint's throat and face and hair and his lips quirk again.

"To borrow some of your colorful and deplorable language," he growls softly, giving Clint goosebumps, "You're fucking right I do. Would it help you….with this?"

Clint squirms, unable to be still against the hot spear of lust that stabs through him when Phil curses, and nods breathlessly.

"Oh god, Sir. Yes Sir. I….I want this, I do, so much, but it's….I'm….ugh," he fumbles awkwardly for words, wishing for not the first time that he had a tenth of Phil's eloquence. This is probably why he and Tasha are so well suited for each other. She doesn't like wasting a lot of words, and he's not awesome with them when he's flustered, but they understand each other anyway. Of course, he's always found it easier to talk to Tasha than anyone else. Except maybe, recently, Jane. This, though, it's overwhelming him and he's feels sort of cast adrift without an anchor. Thankfully, Phil understands him too.

"You're still nervous," supplies Coulson helpfully.

"Yeah."

Phil leans down and kisses him, quick and hard, and then backs off until he sits on his heels near the foot of the bed, gazing up Clint's body with what can only be described as hunger. Clint squirms some more, because Phil's eyes make him feel even more naked than he already is.

"Turn over on your stomach, little boy, and grab hold of the headboard again. Don't let go."

"Yes Sir, I mean no Sir, I won't," promises Clint, and does it, hurriedly. He buries his face in the pillow underneath him and waits, breathlessly. Coulson's hand lightly brushes the curve if his ass and he presses himself up into it, because he can't help it. The hand squeezes once, gently, and then the almost ticklish sensation of Phil's hand touching him so carefully is replaced by the sharp sting and what seems to him an earsplitting crack of Coulson's hand impacting his backside. He sucks in his breath and squirms harder than ever, his aching erection rubbing maddeningly against the bedspread. It feels so _good_, but it's not enough pressure to make him come. The hand comes down again, forcefully, the wrist snapping at the end so the sensation is all sting and not the bone-jarring impact of the full force of Phil's arm. After five, he's writhing against the comforter like he's fucking it, panting. After ten, his raising his hips up to meet Phil's hand, and spouting filth at him, babbling like an idiot, which is okay, because it makes Phil chuckle and hit him harder.

"Fuck, Sir. Do it. More. I want you to. Jesus, shit. You sick bastard, you love this. _Unngh._ Don't stop, please don't stop. Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Jesus Sir, you're good at this. _Ohhh_ motherFUCK. Yes, goddamn. Yess. FFuuuuccckkk."

Coulson pauses for a few seconds and Clint whines, because he is NOT DONE yet.

"We are going to have to have a _conversation_ about your language, boy," he says sternly, and the only person in the world who could honestly say they can hear the smile in his voice is Hawkeye.

"Wh_…ahh_…what kind of conver…sation, Sir," he gasps out when Phil resumes the firm, steady spanking.

"The kind that involves my belt, your insubordinate _ass_, about an hour, and you being given something else to do with that mouth," says Phil, his voice thick with what Clint hopes is lust.

"Language, Sir!" he jokes, and then is unable to bite back a cry of actual pain when Phil retaliates, forcefully. It's the only time the spanking actually hurts. It's all sharp tingling sting that make his ass feel like he's been sitting on a hot stovetop, but which in no way threatens to break his control and push him into real pain, or tears. He's glad. He thinks the intensity of that would probably kill him right now. This isn't cathartic like what Tasha did to him, and has occasionally also happened since when he's been in dire need of an emotional release he's not capable of allowing himself on his own. It isn't overwhelming or devastating in any way, it is only hot and stimulating and good, and it steadies him, and drives every last bit of nerves out the window, until he is in the end shamelessly grinding himself into the mattress and making small mewling sounds of need because he's no longer capable of coherent speech. He is floating in a sea of sensation and need, and while it is maddening to his aroused state, it also makes him feel secure, almost peaceful. He's so blissed out when Phil stops, he knows his pupils are blown so wide you can barely see the blue-gray of his irises. Gently, Phil urges him over on his back, and he whines a little at the loss of the friction of the bedspread against his aching cock. He just lays there for several long seconds with his eyes closed, panting and making small, incoherent sounds, which culminate in what can only be described as quite nearly a shocked, agonized howl when something warm and wet envelops the head of his dick and sucks. He slits his eyes open and then slams them shut again because Christ he doesn't want to come yet but Phil has his _mouth_ there. With his eyes closed, it's okay, he can manage not to go over too soon, because although he had been assuming that men gave blowjobs very differently from women, it's actually a fact that it doesn't feel any different at all to his dick. He groans and concentrates on long-division in his head. Mercifully, it does not go on too long, so that he hasn't really recovered from the shock of seeing Phil with his mouth on Clint's cock, and realizing also that Coulson is really _good_ at this. He dares to open his eyes again when it ends, and sees Phil sitting casually between his outspread thighs. He's removed his coat, shirt and trousers at some point while Clint was lost in sensation, and his erection is a lot more noticeable in his snug boxer-briefs. Clint grips the headboard so tightly he feels the edges of the wood digging into his palms. He can only see one of Phil's hands, the one currently tracing gentle circles on the inside of his right thigh. The whereabouts and intentions of the other hand are revealed when Coulson slowly but unhesitatingly slides his index finger into him. It's slick with something, and Clint belatedly notices an open bottle of lubricant sitting beside them on a bedside table. He writhes when Phil withdraws and then slides the finger in again, pressing briefly against his prostate before pulling back out. This goes on for several minutes while Clint whimpers and squirms and gasps. When it's two fingers, he's reduced to begging.

"Please Sir, I'm ready. Do it. Fuck me. Jesus, I can't….ohgodohgod….nnnn….no more, I can't….I can't wait anymore. Phil! Sir! Please!"

"Have you been good enough to deserve a fucking, boy?" asks Phil huskily.

"I…hnnn….oh Sir, please. I don't know. I think so. Just….please!"

"You're pretty when you beg," Phil muses smugly, which wrenches a guttural moan from Hawkeye. He knows he's acting like a mindless thing, but he doesn't think he can wait ONE FUCKING MINUTE more. And then, oh god, oh shit, oh fuck, he's flipped back onto his stomach and Phil gently presses the cheeks of his ass apart and there is more of the slippery stuff and he's nearly sobbing because he knows Phil's going to do it now, going to fuck him, put his cock inside him, and he aches for it but he's suddenly terrified too, because Phil's bigger than the phallus Natasha had used. A lot bigger.

He feels the soft nudge of the head of Phil's cock pressing against his hole, and he's suddenly really scared. He doesn't think it's going to fit. Thinks it's going to hurt him, a lot. Thinks he can't do it.

"Sir!: he cries in an agony of nerves and lust and uncertainly. Coulson goes very still, but does not pull away. "I don't….I think….I can't…."

"You can," says Phil firmly. "You will." His voice is deadly earnest, the tone of command that brooks no protest, and Clint forces his tightly coiled muscles to relax, because obeying Phil's commands is, in the end, one of the easiest things he knows how to do.

"Yes Sir," he whispers, and feels the prickle of tears in his eyes, though they do not spill over.

Phil eases forward with agonizing slowness, filling him gradually but inexorably. The stretch and burn of it, the absolute sense of being_ invaded_ are both terrible and exhilarating. He hugs the pillow to his face and whines through his teeth at the burn, but Coulson won't have it, and his head is pulled back roughly. He gasps.

"Don't hide from me, boy," he snarls, and pushes in another inch, wrenching something close to a scream out of Clint.

"Sir!" he cries desperately. "I…ohgod…I ca…_nng_ ….can't. It…._ahh…_it burns. Oh _fuck_ you're big. Please Sir!"

"Please what?" asks Phil, almost pleasantly, though Clint can hear the strain in his voice.

"I don't know!" cries Hawkeye. "Please Sir, it hurts."

"Does it?" asks Coulson, not stopping his advance.

"I…_fuckfuckfuck…._yes!"

"Good," says Phil simply, and _shoves_. Clint howls, his body trembling, hands scrabbling on the headboard as he tries to grasp…something….sanity….anything. Phil feels _monstrous_ inside him. He wonders wildly if you can actually be torn in half. He's aware that his dick hasn't softened one little bit the whole time, and now that Phil's all the way THERE, he stops moving. He holds himself very still, and when Clint turns his head to the side, he sees Phil's hand, palm down, pressed into the mattress, the gold of his watch face gleaming in the dim lamplight. After a minute or so passes, during which he whimpers and pants and tries really hard not to move, he realizes it doesn't hurt so much anymore. After another minute more, he starts to think about the sensation of Phil's cock inside him, buried to the hilt, and the aching sense of fullness and being possessed, and the scent and feel of Phil's body pressing against him from above, and he can't stop himself from rolling his hips up towards Phil a little. A surprised gasp of pleasure escapes his lungs, and he does it again, bucking up against Phil a little now. The mewling sounds have been replaced by soft, needy growls, and he cannot bring himself to care if he sounds like an idiot. The rigidity of Phil's body while he's allowed Clint time to adjust relaxes, and he lowers himself down onto his elbows, so that his body covers Clint's and presses him down into the mattress. Clint moans softly as Coulson's movement shifts the cock inside him, but this time it isn't a moan of pain or fear. Phil rolls his hips forward a little.

"Ohhhhhhh," whispers Clint.

"All right now, little boy?" asks Phil tenderly.

"Yes Sir," he breathes in a small voice.

"I'm going to fuck you now," says Coulson with finality. Clint gulps; Coulson pulls back and then _shoves_ in again. Clint cries out for him, because it isn't pain at all now. The friction of the tug and press of Phil's cock is maddening. He growls and pushes against him, and in a few seconds their bodies are slamming together. Phil fucks single-mindedly, as though he's trying to fuck his way THROUGH Clint and out the other side. There is still pain from time to time, at a particularly vicious thrust, but Clint's cries are not pain sounds. His cock aches like a sore tooth, burrowing need deeply into his belly and twisting around his spine like a serpent, sinuous and strong.

"Phil. Phil. Phil," he gasps, desperate. "Please Sir, I need…ohgodfuckshitgoddamn…I…._hnn…._I gotta…._nng…_I need…Sir…._fuuuuuckkk….._yeah, do it. Fuck me. Harder. Please. Sir! _Ohgod_….Fuck. Yes. Fuck. Do it." After a few minutes of this, he's dimly aware that all that's coming out of his mouth now is "fuckmefuckmefuckmefuckme," and he does not care that he's reduced to monosyllabic drivel. Phil hauls him back by his hips, raising them off the bed, and hammers into him cruelly, while Clint howls with desperation. His eyes are screwed tightly shut against the intense sensations coursing through his overloaded body, so he doesn't see Phil adjust his position a little so he won't need both hands to support himself while he fucks into Clint like a damn locomotive, so Clint's eyes fly open on his shocked cry of pleasure when Phil's hand closes tightly around his dick. It squeezes, slides, pumps up and down slowly while Clint shudders and almost sobs with pleasure.

"Sir…I'm gonna come Sir, please," he pants, his voice frantic as he feels pressure building and coiling insidiously through his body, pulling him towards losing all semblance of control, which he actually thinks he lost as soon as Phil opened the door.

"With me," Phil growls, leaning close and spilling his need-roughened voice into Clint's ear like warm sweet molasses. Clint feels his toes curl as he senses the older man's rhythm falter, as Phil's hands dig convulsively into his hips and he gasps Clint's name. Feeling the warm rush of his handler's release inside him is the final straw, and Clint comes, howling, over Coulson's hand and onto his tasteful comforter, his fingers white as he clamps down on the headboard and shakes. Coulson's shocked cry at the spasms inside the archer is music in his fevered brain. At last, the tremors subside, and they are both wring out and panting, bodies sheened with sweat, sticky with come and also a little bit of blood, which doesn't bother Clint at all right now, though he's aware he's going to be really sore tomorrow. This thought is confirmed quite a bit sooner when Phil slowly pulls out of him and his insides cramp against the withdrawal, wringing another whine from him. Phil chuckles. Clint wonders if he's capable of calling up a creditable pout, but decides he's too tired. Coulson rolls him onto his side and hauls him close. Clint, to his surprise, finds himself suddenly close to tears. He has not felt so utterly wrung out and _owned_ in….well…..ever. fleetingly his mind wonders if this is disloyalty to Tasha, but as she so carefully pointed out to him before they agreed on this, it is apples and oranges. He stops analyzing and lets himself relax against Phil's body. Phil runs his hand softly over Clint's hair.

"Good boy,: he whispers, and Clint shivers.

"Thank you, Sir."

"Thank _you_," says Phil warmly.

They doze for a while, sort of tangled up together, until hunger rouses them both. Phil takes him into the shower and he finds the experience shakes him to his core as the older man treats him tenderly as though he is a fragile and lovely thing, and it pours into and fills up every empty reservoir of daddy kink Clint's carried around since he left the circus. Phil seems to know this on an innate level, and his voice is warm and gentle and kind, his hands careful and attentive, and Clint feels himself longing to curl up at Coulson's feet and stay there forever.

The practicality of this is, of course, absurd, and they're ravenous when they emerge from the shower, whereupon Phil fixes them grilled cheese sandwiches and bowls of creamy tomato soup with goldfish crackers. Clint throws a handful of them at Phil, and shivers all over when Phil looks at him sternly. When they are nearly done eating, there is a knock at the door. It's Tasha. She looks worried, and Clint feels a twinge of guilt when he realizes he's been gone for almost six hours now.

She takes one look at the expression on his face, what they are eating, and the casual way Phil's hand rests on Hawkeye's knee and she smiles.

"Good. You've managed not to kill each other. Neither of you answered your phones. I got worried."

"I'm sorry, Tash," he says remorsefully, hunching his shoulders.

"My apologies, Agent Romanov," says Phil sincerely. "That was insufferably rude of us."

Natasha waves this away, staring at Clint with great interest. He knows he looks like he feels, fucked out and blissed out of his mind and dreamy. She looks from him to Phil and back again, a slow smirk spreading across her face.

"Was he a good boy for you, Agent Coulson?" she asks with a grin she can't quite conceal. Coulson rubs his hand over Clint's head and down his back again, and Clint sighs contentedly.

"I'm not entirely sure whether he was very, very good or very, VERY bad," muses Phil with humor in his tone. Clint grins and sticks out his tongue, and it feels fantastic.

"You know, San Francisco is only about two and a half hours by Quinjet," muses Tasha, and suddenly Clint's entire future takes on a new meaning.

"So it is," agrees Phil comfortably, smiling at both of them.

"Maybe next time we can punish him together," she muses. Clint chokes on his soup and whimpers.


	2. Chapter 2

_**Okay, this is Valerie's fault! :D~**_

_**Not really, or not entirely anyway. It's an illness, you all know that. Once I open up a thing and write about it, it has an ugly habit of growing on me. Stealing Away was supposed to be ONE chapter. ONE! I swear, it isn't my fault. Again, this is slash. Don't read if it offends. But ok read it, cause it's hawt! OMG I'm killing mysef here...Oh, for those to whom it may be touchy, there is some semi-non-con content in here which is reality is not technically nonconsensual at all in the end, but I better include the warning anyway.  
**_

When Tasha had told him she had to be in Prague with Fury for a week, he'd been kind of bummed. There hasn't been a decent alien to kill in weeks. Things are in fact depressingly quiet for people of action like the members of the Avengers Initiative. Well, except for Bruce, who always gets happier the longer he gets to go between calls. He and Jane and Tony are still hard at work in the lab though, except when Thor keeps Jane too occupied to show up, which never really surprises any of the others. He thinks it alarms Bruce a little when Jane plays hooky from work though, because Darcy seems to confound him. Privately, Clint thinks this is hilarious. Darcy's never careful around Bruce like every other female staff member and agent of SHIELD he's ever seen interact with the scientist. He doesn't know if all of them are afraid he's going to be overcome with lust at the sight of them and hulk out, or if women are just more aware of the fragility of their bodies than men. Darcy harangues him, teases him, laughs at him, argues with him about everything under the sun. Darcy also brings him the tea he likes best and makes sure he eats and notices when he starts to get a headache and brings him aspirin. Clint doubts very seriously that Bruce is aware of this, because he's possibly the most oblivious person he knows, except maybe for Thor when someone makes a pop culture reference.

He has no experiments to run though, being a man of action and definitely not science, so a week of Tasha off at some stupid conference with Fury is kind of depressing. When she forces him onto a Quinjet and sends him to San Francisco, he spends the trip up to the roof arguing with her (until she stops in the stairwell and shoves him up against the wall and spends a few minutes convincing him forcibly that it's not because anything's cooling off between them) and the first part of the flight feeling guilty about it. The second half of the flight he's overcome with nerves. What if Phil doesn't want to see him? What if their couple of nights together before Phil left were just a fling, and he's put it behind him? What if he gets there and Phil's found a lover and Clint just gets in the way and has to turn around and fly home in humiliation? What if…..

What if Natasha's called ahead to let him know, and Phil is waiting on the helipad on top of the San Francisco headquarters with his tie and jacket flapping in the force of the 'jet's rotors, looking up at the sky as they come in for a landing, a huge smile on his face, waving and smiling some more and actually raising up a little on his toes in impatience for it to be safe for him to run under the slowing rotors and open the door.

Clint ducks his head a little and hides his idiotic grin because it makes him feel like a dumb kid with a crush.

"Hi," he says lamely.

"Hi," Phil says back, not at all bothering to hide his own grin. Coulson, grinning for the second time in his life? His face will crack!

Then they're in the elevator and Phil looks up, where a tiny black dot in the corner is the only sign that the car is under surveillance, and he recites some kind of a code out loud that includes his name and ID number and an override. Then his hand fists in Clint's t-shirt and Clint wonders dazedly if he should get one of the people in the uniform design team to start sewing padding into the backs of all his shirts as a personal favor since he's starting to spend an inordinate amount of time being slammed up against walls. But Phil's kissing him and he loves it, loves the shoving and the explosion of his breath as he connects with the wall of the elevator, and the twist of his shirt tightening around his neck and chest, and Phil's mouth on his, and the smell of him. He whimpers a little, and he doesn't care.

"How long can you stay?" growls Phil into his mouth.

"A week," gasps Clint, his cock hardening so fast it makes him giddy when Phil forces his head back and bites him, hard, on the side of his neck.

That night it is just as awesome as it was the first time, except that he's not scared now, because he knows what to expect when Phil prepares him, when he takes him, slowly, carefully at first, and then hard like he needs it. They talk and eat and fuck and watch a movie and fuck some more and he sleeps like a baby with his head on Phil's shoulder. Nastasha calls in the morning to see how things are, and she can tell from the unaccustomed shyness in his voice that they are, indeed, perfect, so she makes him tell her, in detail, about the previous night. It's evening in Prague, and she's alone in her hotel room. He can tell she's touching herself while he describes how it feels to suck Phil's cock for the first time, and what it's like when Phil holds him down and uses his fingers to stretch him until it makes him whine, and what it feels like when Phil slides into him and starts to move. He can hear it in her breathing, and he's glad Phil has already gone down to work because listening to her panting into the phone and knowing what her busy fingers are up to, and the throaty way she asks him what happened next drives him nuts, and it doesn't matter that he came three times yesterday, he's hard and hot and aching in his pants until he has to take himself out and then they're having phone sex, only the sex is about him and Phil, which makes it seem like something dirty and voyeuristic and taboo.

"Clint," whispers Tasha, and he can tell by the tone in her voice that she's about to come. "When we're done here, I'm coming there. And he's going to bend you over and fuck you until you're screaming for him, and…._ohhh fuck_…and I'm going to watch."

"Jesus, Tasha, fuck," he groans, and comes in his own hand like he hasn't done in a long damn time, and he feels silly but it's great too, and he knows she joins him because she whispers several really filthy things in Russian and groans so softly it's barely a whimper, but when she's working, Tasha is never as abandoned as when they are alone together.

"See you in a week," she says menacingly, hanging up. She's really mean sometimes.

The first two days are incredible. Phil shows him around the new San Francisco HQ, of which he is apparently actually the HEAD now, and aint that a kick in the pants? He's absurdly proud of Phil, and gets a huge charge out of the way all the agents and staffers there treat him with immense respect and stop to let him pass in the halls and call him "Director." The training facilities are good, so he works out, and practices with a new bow Phil has apparently been having his R&D team work on based on a few random comments he'd made to his handler ages ago on an op in Nepal when he'd pointed out a couple of really minor changes he'd have made to the design if he'd been doing it himself. And now here they are, implemented exactly as he'd described them, running his fingers over the weapon and pointing out to Phil how it slanted this much _here_ and how he wished it slanted that much _there _instead, and how he'd have made it easier for himself to adjust the pull by doing this to that pulley and moving this hinge this many centimeters…..

It's a work of art, and he loves it, and it makes him feel like about a hundred million bucks, and his aim is even better than before, which is almost not even possible.

On the third day, Phil has a lot of meetings, and that's okay, but Hawkeye doesn't really know what to do with himself. He goes out and wanders around San Francisco, but he feels a little at loose ends, so he just goes back to Phil's apartments and watches TV until the Director of Operation of the West Coast branch of SHIELD comes home, looking a little stressed out and tired. Clint takes one look at him and jumps up to follow Phil into the bedroom, where he helps him out of his shiny shoes and his suit and rubs Phil's shoulders until the headache he can see behind the older man's eyes goes away. That's a pretty good night too.

On the fourth day, Clint Barton is bored. He tries to find things to occupy him, he really does, but after a couple of hours of channel changing, half-hearted target practice, and less than two miles of the ten mile jog he meant to take, he finds himself outside Phil's office door, knocking uncertainly.

He hears Phil's voice say, "Come in," and opens it, stepping inside to stand right by the threshold, feeling kind of awkward and uncertain.

Coulson gets up from his desk and comes hurriedly to Clint's side, looking worried.

"Is something wrong, Agent Barton?" he asks, concern in his blue eyes. Phil often falls back on protocol when they're inside SHIELD's halls, not because he bothers to deny their relationship, but just because the habit is so ingrained in him, and he is a consummate professional. Clint doesn't mind. He feels just as subordinate to Phil as his agent as he does as his lover.

"No Sir," he says, hunching his shoulders and poking at a tiny imperfection in the carpet with the toe of his tennis shoe. Phil looks relieved.

"Then what is it?"

"I'm bored," confesses the archer. "Can I….is it okay if I just…hang out where with you, Sir? Please?"

Coulson's worried frown eases into an indulgent smile, and his hand comes up to gently brush the shaggy, disheveled tips of Clint's hair.

"Sure you can," he says, "but I have a lot of work to do, so you're going to have to be a good boy and let me get it all done."

"Yes, Sir," he says eagerly, because just being here with Phil is enough, he'll just sit over there on the couch and watch him work, and that's a lot better than wandering aimlessly around HQ or even the city.

Or so he thinks. It's ok for the first little bit. He likes watching Phil work. The older man looks so authoritative behind his huge desk, a frown of concentration on his face as he reads reports and files them, fills out others with his clean, neat handwriting. He studies test results and order forms and inventories, licking his thumb with the tip of his tongue when pages stick together. The way his fingers hold the slender silver pen remind Clint of the way those fingers feel when they touch him. The quick dart of Phil's tongue on the ball of his thumb is tantalizing. The way his shoulders shift inside his charcoal gray, pin-striped coat as he reaches for or files away various papers make him think about how strong Phil actually is. He manages to drive himself right into a state that makes his skin itch all over, and Phil isn't even glancing up to look at him now and then. Which is, he thinks, entirely unfair. The office setting and huge, dark mahogany desk, and Phil in his immaculate suit remind Clint forcefully of being sent to the Principal's office when he was a kid, before he joined the circus, except Phil doesn't have a big, scary paddle hanging on the wall. Why doesn't Phil have a big, scary paddle hanging on the wall? Even sitting over here, on the other side of the room, on the couch that is lower than the desk and thus serves to keep the top of his head a lot lower than Coulson's, reinforces the feeling. He's getting disturbingly aroused by his own thoughts, and the just SITTING here, dwelling on it, and Phil sitting there so focused, so indifferent, drives him nuts.

He flops back deeper into the sofa with an exaggerated sigh. Phil keeps working. He flings himself to the other end of the couch and sighs again, louder. This time Phil's eyes flick over to him, and he raises an eyebrow. Clint subsides, and Phil goes back to work. It doesn't last. He can't imagine that Phil's doing anything so important that he couldn't take a break for a minute. He wonders if Phil would let him blow him under the desk. Imagining this occupies his mind for almost another half hour, then he grows fidgety again. He shifts, turns a little, and flops to his back on the sofa, which is leather and thus creaks every time he moves. Which he does, about every ten seconds or so.

"Is there something wrong with the couch, Agent?" asks Phil dryly, though when Clint looks at him, Phil hasn't even looked up from what he's writing. He sighs. Again.

"No Sir."

"Then kindly stop behaving as though it were made of thistles and be quiet."

Clint pouts a little, and since Coulson has finally looked up at him when he says this last, he sees it. Clint thinks he sees the tiniest quirk at the corner of Phil's mouth, but he can't be sure. He's quiet for a little while, but he's too worked up and restless for it to last.

"Phil," he says eventually, quietly. Phil ignores him, focusing on signing a huge stack of what are probably requisition orders. "Phil," he tries again, with the same result. "Phil!"

"What?" asks Phil after a few more repetitions, sounding a little put-upon.

"I wanna suck you off under your desk while you work," he whispers loudly, with a lascivious grin.

"No," says Phil calmly, going back to signing.

Clint groans in frustration.

"Please?"

"No."

"Please?"

"No."

"Pleeeeeeeeeease?"

"No."

"Phil!"

"What?"

"PLEASE?"

Phil looks up at him again, his pen still in his hand, tapping it against his papers in annoyance.

"I told you I had a lot of work to do today. If you can't sit there and be good, you can go back to my rooms at any time."

"There's nothing to do there," he says, and the whine in his voice almost cracks him up, but he's trapped himself in the principal's office fantasy and can't get out, so what the hell.

"There's nothing to do here either," points out Coulson logically.

"There's you."

"You don't get to do me, Clint," says Coulson, and this time he does actually sort of smile. Almost.

"Nooooo," says Clint. "But you could do me."

"No one is doing anyone. Sit over there and be quiet and let me finish my work. Listen to some music on your phone or play Angry Birds, or read a book, but BE QUIET." The last words are forceful, and Clint moans a little, to himself. This could be so HOT if only Phil would stop being a stickler and go with it! He rolls his eyes in an exaggerated fashion and mutters to himself while he drags his phone out of his pocket. He tries playing Angry Birds for a while, but he's beaten the game so many times with perfect scores that it isn't fun anymore. He gets out his earbuds and puts the mp3 player app on shuffle on his 80's alternative playlist. He loves that era. Frankie Goes To Hollywood fills his ears and that just doesn't help at all.

"Relax, don't do it….when you wanna come," he sings under his breath, watching Phil from under half-closed eyelids. And ohhh yeah, he wants to. This is ridiculous. He's way too cute right now for Phil to be ignoring him. He gets up from the couch and walks toward the desk, the music in his ears putting a little sway in his hips as he lets his body move with the beat, nearly dancing as he stalks slowly over to where Phil is working. He's a great dancer and he knows it. The jeans he's wearing today are well-worn and soft, and cling to him like he was poured into them, hugging his ass and thighs, snug around his increasingly hard dick. Phil's watching him approach, though he doesn't stop working. Clint stops in front of the desk, pulling out his earbuds, and leans forward until he can put his elbows on it, ducking his head and grinning up at Phil under his eyelashes.

"You could punish me for misbehaving," he purrs suggestively, and wiggles a little, thinking about it. One of Phil's eyebrows lifts a fraction, and he sets aside a form and takes another, making Clint huff impatiently.

"You're certainly acting like you deserve it," he says drily, without stopping. Christ, how does the man DO that? He's being outrageous and he knows it, but fuck, Phil's so fucking HOT right now, he can't stand it.

"I know, right?" he agrees encouragingly, arching his back a little so his ass sticks out. Without a word, Phil points at the couch with his non-dominant hand and keeps FUCKING WRITING! Clint turns over and drapes himself onto the desk with a soft, breathy groan, putting his head almost directly under Phil's face on top of the report he's reading, and smiling up at him as winsomely as he knows how. "C'mon Sir, you know you wanna," he coaxes.

"I certainly do," agrees Phil. "You're behaving atrociously."

"Yessss," urges Clint. "I'm being reallllllly bad. You know you wanna make me sorry, dontchya?" he whines eagerly.

"You wouldn't enjoy it," says Phil calmly, which frustrates Hawkeye even more.

"Why not?" he asks innocently, and squirms a little, still gazing up at Phil from his back. Phil's eyes darken, though his expression remains completely collected.

"Because I would bend you over this desk, take off my belt, and whip your bare ass with it until you cried," he says quietly, his voice a little rough, the only outward sign that he is affected. Clint whimpers.

"Not hearing anything I wouldn't enjoy yet, Sir," he says breathlessly.

"Then I would take out my cock, spit on it a little because of course I do not keep personal lubricant in my workspace," he says, and there's a distinct growl in his voice now, even though he's sliding papers into files. Clint gasps, eyelids fluttering shut, his belly clenching hard with lust.

"What would you do then, Sir?" he breathes.

"I'd fuck you, without any prep work, deep and hard and burning, while you sobbed, and I wouldn't stop, because naughty boys deserve what they get."

"Jesus, Phil," gasps Clint, the filthy threats coming from Phil's mouth while he sits there all perfectly groomed behind his fancy desk in his center of power sending a vicious shard of need spearing straight to his cock, which is now so hard it hurts.

Phil really looks at him now, and Clint can see that his pupils have dilated so that there is only a slender ring of blue around them, and a faint flush colors his cheeks. He can't see Phil's lap under his desk, but he knows Coulson's turned-on now too. His hand slides across the surface of the desk and tangles in the hair on top of Clint's head, fisting hard and pulling him a few inches closer over the glossy surface of the desk so that he can lean down until they are face to face. Clint whimpers.

"You have until I count to three to get off my desk and go sit back down like a good boy, or you're getting EXACTLY what I just described," he hisses softly. He lets go abruptly. "One…."

Hawkeye loses his mind. Phil might mean the threat. He even recognizes that it would hurt, a really, really lot. Right at this moment, he doesn't care. He wants, so badly he can taste it, and he wants to know what will happen if he doesn't move. He's being exactly as awful and snotty as he was when he was a rotten teenager, and even though he hasn't been that rotten kid in several years now, acting this way is so….he doesn't know how to describe it….it's heady, and freeing, because the reason he acted that way THEN was because it was armor to hide his loneliness and self-esteem issues but NOW it's just fun and naughty and he's cared-for and it's making him a little giddy. Also, he's has never known how to step back from that line drawn on the ground. Nope. Gotta cross it every time. He grins saucily up at Phil.

"Two…"

Clint waves at Phil with his fingers, staying put, even though part of his brain is screaming at him to stop being an idiot before he regrets it. He doesn't listen to that part, only the part that is reeling with thoughts of,

"Would he? Will he really? _Just _like he said? Oh god, I wanna know. Will it hurt? Bad?"

"Three," snaps Coulson, and without any warning at all, he stands up and drags Clint off his desk by the collar of his shirt. Clint stumbles and nearly falls on the floor, but manages not to, and notices fleetingly that the front of Phil's trousers are looking a little too tight. Before he can relish this fact, he finds himself spun around and shoved facedown over the edge of the desk.

"Lock door," snaps Coulson, "DND status, emergency override only."

The DND stands for Do Not Disturb, and Clint knows that the only thing that can save him now is a real emergency. He can't even open the door from the inside unless Phil lets him. His belly clenches hard and he is as afraid as he is aroused, which only makes the latter worse. He squirms and moans a little when he hears the faint rattle of Phil's belt buckle as the older man starts to unbuckle it.

"Pants down," snaps Phil. "Now."

Clint's fingers are shaking, and he fumbles a little with the buttons on his jeans, finally just pulling them all loose with a quick poppoppop, and shoving them over his hips and down, where he feels them sag around his knees, which are, ok, knocking just a little. Jesus, what the fuck has he gotten himself into? But at the same time, he's thinking oh pleasepleaseplease Phil, do it, all of it, please. He hasn't cried since the day Tasha broke him, and for some reason he desperately wants Phil to make him, craves the rush of relief only tears can bring, when they're wrung from him by someone he loves. Loves? Yeah, ok, he can own that. It isn't the same way he loves Tasha, because they are different people and meet different needs in his soul, but he can be ok with admitting he loves Phil too. Especially because he realizes Tasha's known it longer than he has and she's okay with it too. He's not wearing underwear today, because he recognizes that part of him was hoping for something like this. He hears the slithery sounds of leather sliding though cloth, then jumps a little in startlement when he feels Phil's hand stroke once, gently, down the curve of his ass. He feels the weight of his lover against his back as Phil leans forward to whisper in his ear.

"What is your safeword, boy?" he asks roughly.

"Red, Sir," whispers Clint. He feels rather than sees Phil nod shortly.

"Now listen to me carefully," says the authoritative voice. "You do not get to use it because you are scared or in pain, do you understand me? You have earned this punishment and it IS going to be painful. You will only use it if you are truly in a kind of distress that warrants it. I mean to hurt you, but not to traumatize you. Do you understand the difference? I can promise you that I know what I'm doing, and it isn't going to harm you, but baby?"

"Yes Sir?" Clint gasps, transfixed by what Phil's saying.

"It's going to hurt _so_ much, and I'm going to love every second of it, you horrible brat."

Clint's eyes roll back in his skull and he almost slides off the desk to puddle on the floor at Phil's feet, but dimly recognizes that this would probably only make things worse. There's a clink that he's pretty sure is Phil wrapping the buckle end of his belt around his fist. He senses movement as Phil draws his arm back, and then a bright hot slash of PAIN explodes across both cheeks of his ass and he sucks in his breath sharply at the immediacy of it. Jesus Christ, the man has a strong arm. His belt isn't designed to do the kind of damage the whip Tasha had used had done, but Phil is SO much stronger in his upper body than Tasha that it honestly hurts nearly as bad, even though it doesn't cut him. Well, he doesn't think it cuts him. The second stroke makes him whimper and bite his lip. Oh god, it's really really bad. What was he thinking? Phil's dress belt is slender but thick, and blisters across his naked flesh like a brand. The third stroke makes him cry out a little, though he tries to muffle it by pressing his mouth against his forearm where he's braced on the gleaming surface of Phil's desk. Then suddenly, the faint scent of the furniture polish, the feel of Phil's dress slacks brushing the outside of his left thigh, the overwhelming sensation of helplessness, it all washes over him and he relaxes. It doesn't hurt any less, not by a long shot, but his rising panic vanishes like smoke in the wind and he welcomes it, lets it wash over and burn through him, scouring out and cleansing dark corners in his heart that men like him who kill for a living will always have. He muffles his cries and sinks his teeth into the ropey muscle of his forearm, and he writhes in agony under the vicious kiss of Phil's belt but he _revels_ in it now. He becomes aware that Phil is talking to him in a low voice as he methodically and thoroughly leathers every single centimeter of Clint's bared flesh, including the backs of his thighs, which oh geez oh fuck oh SHIT really hurts.

"When I tell you to sit quietly and let me work, you will obey me, do you understand?" snarls Phil, and it makes Clint wince in shame but even as he hunches and tucks his head, Phil's hand strokes over his heated skin, scraping a little with fingernails and making him whine, and he realizes Phil isn't truly angry with him, and that the snarl in his voice is thinly veiled lust.

"I'm sorry," he yelps contritely, feeling about fifteen again, and Jesus it's so good, even though he knows he's going to break soon. For a fleeting second he is horrified and embarrassed by the thought of crying like a kid in front of Phil, but the next stroke of the belt, harder than ever, erases it and he remembers it's what Phil WANTS him to do.

"You're going to be even sorrier when my cock shoves into your naughty little ass when you're tight and scared and not ready for it," Phil's voice hisses, and he groans loudly, raising his hips towards the belt a little. Dimly he understands that it's going to be pretty fucking bad but that if he's broken down first, if he's softened by his own tears and submission, it's going to be easier.

"Going to bawl for me like the naughty little brat you are, and every sob, every whimper and whine and squeal you make is going to make your sore little asshole clench around my cock like a fist and it's going to feel so good to me, little boy. So good. I'm going to love fucking you while you're sobbing for me, baby."

Ffffuuuckk he's never known Coulson had this in him, this filth, this deep sadistic streak, and it's making him dizzy. Phil's words drip into his brain like melted candy spiked with venom and he sucks them down greedily at the same time that the venom paralyzes and terrifies him.

"Please Sir," he cries, and knows his voice is thinner, higher, clearer than it was before, but he doesn't care, he's lost in the role now and it's gorgeous even though it's also painful and terrifying. "I'm sorry!"

"Little boys are always sorry when they're being punished," says Phil, and Clint hears the mild humor in his voice. The humor doesn't make him less mean though, and the belt licks viciously across the backs of Clint's legs, once, twice, three times in quick succession on the same spot. He chokes on a sob, and hot tears prickle in his eyes.

"Let go for me, little boy," purrs Phil encouragingly, and blisters his ass even harder, and how is that even possible? Clint shudders and yelps and squirms until Phil barks sharply at him to be still. He obeys, shaking and gritting his teeth, and even though he wants this, wants to let Phil break him down, it's so _hard_ to finally let go. He has been tortured, beaten, battered and injured in the line of duty and never shed a tear. Tasha has broken him, but that was hell, and he never wants to feel that way with her ever again. This man has been his handler, his superior, his boss, for so many years, and being strong and steady for Phil has been part of his mantra when things go south on an op for so long that his training is getting in the way of what they both want right now. His cry at the next stroke is all agonized frustration.

Phil understands. Phil always does. Clint feels the agent's hand stroke gently over his hair and the back of his neck, where it is damp with sweat. It rubs sure and steady down the long muscles of his back where he is rigid with his own inner struggle.

"It's all right, Clint," he says softly, "I have you. You're safe. Let go."

Then he whips his belt across the lower curve of Clint's cheeks, hard, and his tenderness combined with the brutal kiss of pain is all it takes. Shaking with relief and agony, Clint feels a sob burst from his chest, and the tears burning at the backs of his eyes spill over, hot on his cheeks. Phil keeps the palm of his hand on Clint's lower back, sliding it under the hem of his t-shirt to rest, warm and gentle, on his hot skin while Phil keeps whaling away at him until he's doing it, bawling like a punished little boy, unembarrassed and completely unhinged. He cries, and he begs forgiveness, and he pleads for mercy, and it's glorious.

"Puh….puh…please Sir," he chokes. "I'm suh…sorry! I'll be good, I puh…promise. Nuh…nuh…no more,it hurts! Oh please, Sir, please, it huh…hurts so much!"

Phil makes a sound deep in his chest that is part growl and part possessive pride, and Clint hears the belt fall to the floor. Phil's hands stroke his back and the blazing, welted, swollen skin of his backside, which feels about twice its normal size and throbs in time with Clint's pounding heart. He wants to hurl himself into Phil's arms and be hugged and petted until he stops crying, but when he tries to stand, Phil's strong hand splays against his back and presses him down.

"We're not finished," he says softly, menacingly, and Clint feels his belly clench in fear. He isn't sobbing out loud now that the whipping has stopped, but his tears still flow freely, and faster, when he realizes what's going to happen now.

"Please Sir," he whimpers, crying harder in fear, even though he realizes he's so hard he may come all over Phil's shiny desk any second. "Oh please no. I'll never be bad again, I promise. Please don't do it, don't fuck my ass Sir, please, I'm sorry! I'll be good!"

Phil's finger, wet with what Hawkeye assumes to be his own spit, jabs at his entrance and spears into him roughly. He yelps at the intrusion, which doesn't hurt really, but is startling and scary because of what it presages. Phil pumps it in and out of him a couple of times, then takes it out. Clint feels the splat of something warm and wet on his hole, knows that it's Phil's spit, and he shudders, panting and crying in fear and pain and agonized need. He desperately doesn't want Phil to fuck him like he said he would, and he desperately hopes that Phil _will._ The finger shoves into him again, coating him with spit, and Clint hopes frantically that it's enough, that Phil isn't going to tear him up and damage him. His tears are real, and frightened. He's close to panic again, because Phil's only lubricating him a little, not stretching him, and his dick isn't exactly small.

"Shh," says Phil quietly, calmly, his voice a life preserver that Clint grabs onto like he's drowning. "It's okay, boy. Let go. Trust me."

"I do," cries Clint though his tears. "But I'm scared!"

"I know, baby," says Phil, and the finger in him angles up, presses on his prostate and makes Clint gasp between his gulping sobs. "It's okay to be scared. It's going to hurt," (and oh fuck, when he says that, Clint doesn't understand why, but his own cock jerks and his knees tremble and even through the terror he understands that he does want this) "But to whom do you belong, Clint?"

"You, Sir," sniffles Clint, instantly and without hesitation.

"That's it," says Phil softly, slowly dragging his finger out. "You're mine, and I'll punish you as I see fit, but I'll keep you safe, darling boy. Relax for me."

His voice and his words fill Clint with exactly what he needs, the calm certainty of being owned, and taken, and his panic recedes again. He feels the blunt hardness of Phil's cock pressing against his entrance, wet with saliva but no lube, and his tears flow faster even as his breathing slows from its frightened sobbing. Phil pushes in slowly but inexorably, and Clint whines in the back of his throat as it stretches him. It burns, and his body gives way reluctantly, for he is not loose and open and prepared for it this time.

"Oh god," he cries out, and his hands reach out blindly and grasp the opposite edge of the desk, gripping so tightly he feels the edge of the wood digging in sharply. Phil doesn't shove into him brutally, but it hurts anyway, and he knows he's making desperate mewling sounds amidst his tears, and begging, but he also knows Phil isn't going to stop, and this knowledge steadies him. Phil keeps his word, the good and the bad. He's going to get this, be punished and fucked raw and sore, and through the pain he's so turned on he wants to explode. It burns like a bitch, but he CRAVES it, and he begs for mercy secure in the knowledge that Phil won't give it to him.

Once he is seated deep inside Clint's body, the archer's hole stretched tight and quivering and burning around his cock, Phil simply stands there for a minute, his hands gentle and steady on Clint's hip and back, petting and steadying him.

"I'm really sorry Sir," he says in a voice so small and meek it surprises even himself.

"I know you are," says Phil, and his voice is warm with affection but there's steel in it too. "But I'm still going to finish your punishment. Are you ready?"

"I don't know," admits Clint shakily.

"That's all right. I am," says Phil, and he drags his cock back out of Clint's quivering, aching hole and then he SHOVES. Clint howls, and his fingers scrabble for purchase on the smooth desktop. Motherfucking hell, it's like having a hot poker shoved up his ass, if the poker were the size of a baseball bat! Coolly oblivious to Clint's pained sobs, Phil fucks him hard and deep.

"Please," Clint cries frantically, though even lost in the enormity of what's happening to him, he recognizes that he doesn't really want Phil to stop. He's hurting him, but Clint can tell he's not really damaging him, and the begging is part of it for him, he loves doing it, which he hadn't really known about himself until today, but throws himself into it now, pleading and sobbing and writhing on Phil's desk while Phil holds his hips still and punishes him ruthlessly. "Oh please, no more! I can't take it Sir, it hurts! Please, please, please stop! It hurts so bad. I'm so sorry, I promise. PLEASE Sir, take it out, oh please…."

Phil's voice is rough and ragged and brutal as he ignores Clint's pleas and fucks into him harder.

"Hurts?" he hisses.

"Yes," sobs Hawkeye, squirming and desperate, panting and sniffling and whining, letting out a yelp at a particularly vicious thrust. Phil makes a humming sound of pleasure at the sound, and Clint's cock twitches like a starved thing.

"You want me to stop?" Phil asks him, as he drags himself back, back, until he's almost all the way out.

"Yes," whines Clint, breathless.

"Tough," growls Phil, and shoves himself back inside the sobbing boy bent over his desk. Clint thinks he actually screams then, as Phil starts fucking him in earnest. The pain is almost overwhelming, and he's lost in it, but he feels his body yielding and softening as Phil fucks him open, as his body slowly grows accustomed to the stretch. It doesn't stop aching, and Phil isn't being gentle, but the pain becomes something gorgeous and filthy and hot, not something frightening and too much. Gradually, it becomes just right. He feels Phil's pelvis slap against his burning, punished ass, and Phil's cock anchored inside him deep and sore and certain, and though he doesn't stop crying, his pleas take on an entirely different tone.

"Ohhhhh god," he groans. He can actually hear the smile in Phil's voice when he responds.

"Talk to me baby, tell me what you need," he says softly, and the fucking takes on a different feel. It is still rough, and deep, and he aches, but Phil's hands on him are gentle now instead of confining, and he angles himself more carefully, not punishing but ensuring that his cock rubs over that one perfect spot with every stroke.

"Oh Sir," sobs Clint, his body straining towards Phil now instead of trying to pull away. "Ohhh Sir, fuck me, punish me, I need you to."

"Always," growls Phil, almost a dark chuckle. One of his hands slides from Clint's hip where his fingers have been pressing bruises into his skin, to pinch sharply at one of the many welts on his ass. Clint mewls and squirms, and his hands let go of the desk and steal behind his back, his hands grasping, and Phil takes both his hands in one of his, clasping them there at the small of Clint's back, so that he shudders hard and sinks into it, and feel s so _owned_ that he can hardly put together a coherent thought anymore. He gives up all himself, offers it up to Phil and just lets go. It's magnificent, flawless.

"Oh," he cries, frantic, "Oh please Sir, I need to come, please please please I'm gonna…I can't….oh god oh god…PHIL PLEASE!"

"Can you, little boy?" rumbles Phil, and his voice is tense. "Can you come like this, just from this, from me fucking you?"

"ohhhhgod," groans Clint. "I think so. PLEASE!"

"Then do it," snarls Coulson, his hips snapping forward and wringing another scream from Hawkeye's throat, which is mostly pleasure mixed with pain. "Come for me, boy. Come _now."_ He buries himself deep inside Clint and his fingers dig cruelly into the younger man's hips and captive wrists as he makes an almost inhuman sound as he releases himself inside Clint's shaking body. Phil's words are all it takes, and Clint howls raggedly as his cock erupts under him, and his hole clamps down hard on Phil's cock buried inside him, and his world goes white and sparkling around the edges as his orgasm shakes him to his core. He thinks he may even black out for a few seconds, because suddenly it's a little later, and Phil is standing behind him, taking great ragged, gulping breaths, stroking his back and his sides and his punished flesh, murmuring words of pride and encouragement as he slowly eases himself out of Clint's shaking body.

"Shh, you're a good boy, Clint," he soothes as Clint makes a pained noise, because oh GOD he's really sore. "You were so brave, so good. I'm so proud of you. Shh, baby, you're okay, I've got you. I've got you."

A thousand aches and pains begin to make themselves known to Clint's body, inside and out, and when Phil cleans him gently, he starts to tremble. Before he really knows what's happened, they are on the floor, and Phil's arms are around him as he shudders and proceeds to come very definitely apart at the seams. Phil cradles and rocks him while he cries brokenly with his face buried in Phil's neck, stroking his back and whispering ridiculous endearments and compliments until finally Clint starts to snicker through his tears and then he's not crying at all, he's kissing the silly words out of Phil's mouth and they are leaning back against the window, both with their pants tangled around their ankles, laughing like loons.

"Oh Christ, we're a mess," gasps Clint, wincing as the carpet scrapes and prickles on his sore backside. Phil agrees, chuckling, and helps Clint to his feet. They both stagger, and clutch each other, laughing harder. Clint finds his legs won't quite support him yet, so Phil eases him into his desk chair while he restores himself to come semblance of order, then helps Hawkeye stand up again and affectionately pulls his pants up and helps pull them slowly over Clint's welts. His jeans feel like sandpaper on his ass, and he squirms a little, to make them rub.

"Greedy slut," says Coulson, noticing what Clint's up to.

"Yes Sir," says Clint unrepentantly, because now that he's not a wreck anymore, he feels like he's flying. Everything hurts, but he feels so fucking good he wants to stick his head out this 24th story window and scream it into the wind for everybody in the world to hear. He grabs Phil's suit lapels and kisses him gleefully, hungrily, biting at Phil's bottom lip and slurping on his tongue like he's candy, and making Phil laugh harder.

"Loon," he chuckles affectionately. "Now what do you say we go out for hot dogs and visit the seals at the wharf?"

Clint bounces a little, because it turns out the little boy inside isn't gone for the day at all.

"Okay," he says excitedly. Then he frowns a little. "But don't you have work to do, Sir?"

Phil ruffles his hair and turns to restore some semblance of order to his desk. Clint sees his own tears and snot and come marring the shiny surface and blushes. Phil smiles a little evilly at him.

"Some things would probably tax the aplomb of even my cleaning crew, and they're used to getting blood out of practically everything," he says with a very un-Phil-like grin, in that it is wicked and self-satisfied and, for lack of a better term, naughty. "And I suddenly find myself _perishingly_ hungry, and this office entirely too small. I'm the boss. If I can't take a few hours off when I want to, what good is my new title anyway?"

Clint rolls his eyes a little, because that was what his entire _point_ was in the first place, but if Phil had agreed with him before, he wouldn't be soaring on this awesome endorphin high right now, so that's okay.

Phil swings his arm over Clint's shoulders and pulls him in for a hug, steering them towards the door as he utters the phrases which will unlock it.

"Let's go get you a jacket, boy," he says, planting a kiss on the top of Clint's head. "The wind can be a little chilly on the wharf."

Clint doesn't think about what he's saying, the words just spill from him naturally, like breathing.

"Yes, Master."

Phil Coulson's eyes shine like the stars. He pulls Clint's head close to his own, turning to press his lips close to Clint's ear.

"You have no idea what it does to me, to hear you say that, boy," he says softly, his voice a breathy growl trickling into Clint's ear. "And if you don't want to find yourself taking another fucking a lot sooner than you're ready to, you'd best be careful what you say."

Clint whimpers.

"You wouldn't Sir," he gasps breathlessly, and then they are on the elevator, going down. Phil doesn't let go, but keeps his lips close to Clint's ear so that the cameras and recording devices won't pick up on his words. He can't, after all, keep turning off the surveillance EVERY time they get into an elevator.

"Ohh I would," he assures Clint, who shudders and holds on to Phil's arm to keep from sinking to his knees. "I would lay you down on my bed on your belly, and take my time slicking you up for me, easing you open while you whimpered and whined because you're _so_ sore…"

"God, I really am," gasps Clint, and is astonished to feel his cock twitch a little inside his jeans.

"And I'd take you, slow and deep, even if it made you cry again, and I would wring 'Master' from your pretty mouth until it was the only word you remembered, and I'd take your hand, and use it to wrap my own around your cock where it wept for me, and let you show me how you like to be touched, even as you cried and ached and trembled around my cock fucking you, because you're mine, to use, to hold, to _own,_ so if you can't take that, Clint, beautiful boy, be careful what you say."

Clint stumbles as they exit the elevator, something he never does, and feels himself seized by a heady madness that he doesn't understand, after what he's just been through, but which he doesn't resist either. He leans in, this time pressing his own mouth close to Phil's ear, and breathes what he knows Phil hopes he'll say, even though it's crazy and he doesn't really believe Clint's that reckless.

"Yesss….Master."


	3. Chapter 3

The rest of the week goes by in what seems to Clint to be hardly any time at all. Clint finds it absurdly easy to slip from one headspace to another. At one moment he may be wholly and entirely the himself which really likes to shoot stuff and be up as high as he can get, and misses Tasha, and climbs to the top of the big signal tower attached to the roof of the new HQ so he can see way out over the ocean and sway in the wind (which Phil swears takes ten years off his life but Clint just rolls his eyes and laughs), and enjoys a cold beer after a long workout sometimes and likes 80's music and thrash metal, and watches Ultimate Weapons on the Military Channel because he likes to be able to speak knowledgeably about the newest and best rifles he outshoots, whenever a new SHIELD agent in sniper training tries to look down their nose at his bow. Clint has reduced more than one newbie to tears of humiliation. But only the ones who deserve it. He's better, deadlier, more accurate, more patient, and just….well he's just better, with his bow than any sniper with a gun. He doesn't give a rat's ass if he can't do it from a mile away. He can shoot accurately hanging upside down by one ankle from a hundred yards up in the air in gale force winds if he has to. He's just that fucking good. Then at another moment, with a look from Phil or the right pressure of the man's hand on his neck, he's down, squirming inside with eagerness for whatever Phil wants from him, because it makes Phil smile at him just that way, and there are a lot of things he'd do for that smile. He drops so fast and so easily into that submissive headspace that he's starting to wonder how he even got by this long without it. Inside his head then, everything is simple, and peaceful. He cannot see the faces of any of the dead who live there, inside him. He cannot hear his father's voice, drunk and roaring and angry as he reels down the hall with an electrical cord dangling from his fist, coming closer and closer to the closet where he hides, his skinny arms clutched around his scabby knees while he shivers in terror and prays that just this once, he won't be found. The monsters never find him when he's Phil's. There is no hesitation, no fear, no pride or sense of self. To please another, he understands, is a gift, a grace most people will never understand but which some women and gay men seem to just grasp innately, even if they are not kinky, and who go through their lives with a serenity and satisfaction their detractors can never understand. How can they be happy, staying home, cooking and cleaning, caring for their men? It's demeaning, it's subjugating. Bullshit. Phil never makes him feel like less of a person because he likes to kneel at Phil's feet. He recognizes it for the enormous gift that it is, to wish to serve and to trust enough to lay one's self at the ground at another's feet and say "Here I am. Take all myself, for it is yours, and I give it freely for you to use as you will, and I trust you to keep it safe." Phil does. When he talks to Tasha about it on the phone, worried that what he's feeling might threaten what's between them, he hears her huff with impatience over the long miles.

"Clint," she says, a little irritably. "Do you have the slightest desire to crawl around on a leash behind me and lick my boots and call me Mistress all the time?"

"God. No," he says, feeling weird. "I'll get on my knees for you, and you make me so hard I could pound nails when you feel like hurting me, and I fucking love it, but it's….not like that. I belong to you, Tash…but I don't…._belong_ to you. If that even makes any fucking sense."

"Probably not to most people. Fortunately for you, I'm not most people. I'd find you creepy if you wanted that with me, honestly. I like bossing you around, and I fucking love the way you react when I bite you and pull your hair and use the flogger on you, and when I hold your head and make you use your tongue on me until I say you can stop and…"

"Tash," he growls huskily, and she laughs.

"Miss me?" she chuckles.

"Mm. Come home. I'll show you."

"Yeah, can't wait. Anyway, I am getting really fucking sick of having to reassure you that I understand that it's different. You and I, we're partners. We're equals. I know that submitting to Phil and liking it isn't going to make you stop liking the stuff I do to you, and it's not going to make you stop wanting to do those things to me either. At least, I hope not."

"Not a chance," he assures her, and his voice is a little rough around the edges because he's thinking about the things a whole lot right now.

"Then what the hell is your problem?"

"Jesus Tasha, I don't know. When I talk to you on the phone and all of a sudden I'm thinking about the stuff I've done with Phil, _for_ Phil, and let him do to me, and how it feels like I…shit…like he owns me…and I feel like I'm being disloyal to you, because I wasn't thinking about _you_ when it was happening, and shouldn't I be? Shouldn't I be thinking about you all the time?"

"God, I hope not," she says feelingly, and he can't help but laugh. "That'd just be creepy, Clint. Like, stalker creepy. I don't think about YOU all the time. I think about work, and strangling Tony, and what I'm going to have for dinner, and how many of the random things I can pull out of Fury's desk drawer I could use to kill someone, and punching Tony in the mouth, and when the next invasion or whatever is going to happen, and the places I'd like to go if I ever got a real vacation for more than a stolen weekend, and I hope Bruce is doing okay, and I recite passages from Tolstoy in Russian and then in Mandarin and Japanese and Italian and Portugese…well you get the point there, and about kicking Tony's ass, and about boning Ryan Reynolds."

"You spend an awful lot of time thinking about Star….wait what now?"

She laughs at him.

"Just checking to see if you were paying attention. The point is, you idiot," she says fondly, "Nobody sane and healthy really obsesses like that about anyone, it's not right. Look, does it bother you that sometimes I sleep with marks in the line of duty?"

"Of course not. That's the job. It's different."

"What if I told you that I like it?"

"You….what?"

"Haven't you ever noticed that I always manage not to have sex with the disgusting old creeps or the ones who look like Quasimodo? It's my way of not feeling…like a two bit whore for SHIELD. When I was with the Red Room, there was never a question of how I felt about it. How I felt didn't exist. But now, that's different. Fury doesn't require it of me that I do things…well, people…who I find personally repugnant. He actually doesn't require me to fuck my targets at all, he just requires that I get the job done, and sometimes, that's the most expedient way."

Tasha is one of the most frighteningly expedient people he knows. He's finding himself fascinated by this rather than repelled or jealous, so he listens in fascination.

"If I do decide to fuck a target, because I feel it's the best or fastest or least dangerous way to get the information or cooperation I need, then Clint, the way I keep it from haunting me, making me feel cheap or objectified, it by letting myself enjoy it. I make it a choice, not a necessity. And…I get off on it. Fucking this stranger, this powerful or rich or dangerous man, and it's exhilarating. Since you and I got together, I…ah….I think about you watching us, imagine that you sent me to him, because you get off on it, and that you're hiding in the closet or whatever and watching while he fucks me, and it makes it even filthier and….well…"

"I am so hot for you right now," he says feelingly.

"But I'm telling you that I get off on being with strange men sometimes."

Oh. Well then.

"It's…really a thing for you, not something you make yourself pretend so you can get through it?"

"Maybe at first, when I started doing jobs, I made a choice to MAKE it a fantasy, because I'm honestly not sure if it was…before. But no, I'm not pretending."

He's a bit nonplussed, because he thinks this should probably be upsetting him, and it's just not.

"I'm having a hard time getting the image of watching you fuck another guy out of my head now," he admits a little sheepishly.

"Doesn't make you think I'm not happy with you?" she asks shrewdly.

"No, it's pretty much giving me a hard-on."

"Would it shock you very much if I also tell you that there's a little bit of me that thinks what you're…giving Phil…would be kind of awesome to experience? I'm legitimately not sure I'd ever be able to trust another human being enough to be THAT vulnerable, but when you tell me about it, it does it for me, and not just because you're fucking hot and apparently the whole watching your lover with someone else thing does it for me both ways because yeah that's true, but also because it sounds…kind of amazing. I'm not jealous, Clint, but I think there is a very small part of me that's a little…I don't know, maybe wistful? The amount of control I give to you is about as much as I think I'm able to give, and that's a shit ton more than I ever thought I'd be able to give anyone, and I do love it. I'm not…sorry, or envious, that I can't give that much of myself to another person, I don't want you to think that's what I'm saying, but the…fuck, I'm not good at this shit, I wish you'd just stop worrying this to death…the part of me that gets off on the….the…"

He thinks he can actually hear the discomforted blush he's sure is blooming on her cheeks.

"The ageplay," he says gently. And he sees what she's getting at. They do not do it often, because it isn't easy for her to set aside who she is and enjoy that role very often, but the sixteen-year-old Natalia is sweet and sassy and bratty and easily embarrassed and wants so badly for her older and more experienced boyfriend to be proud of her, and is so very sorry when she's bad. He throttles back on his libido because his imagination is running away with him.

"Yeah," she says, and sounds disgruntled, which is usually how Tasha sounds when she's uncomfortable. "Anyway, I guess my point is, if I even have one anymore because I don't DO this, Clint. I don't reassure people. I _understand_ a little what you get out of it. I am also NOT blowing smoke up your ass, and where the hell do you Americans even GET some of your sayings, when I tell you that I seriously do want to watch you with him because I think it would be fucking hot. Why do I care that someone meets a need for you that I'm not capable of meeting? If I could, and you went elsewhere for it, I'd cut your nuts off with a rusty spoon, but I _can't_. It's completely beyond me why people get angry at their lovers for HAVING needs they can't meet, like people CHOOSE to be wired a certain way. Everyfuckingthing about our relationship fucking works, you asshole. It isn't your fault that this one part of you needs something different from what we are together. You didn't just wake up and decide one day to develop a submissive streak that craves more than being topped to feel fed. It's always been in you, or else was created in you when you were too young to understand how events were molding you into who you became. Does nobody else on the planet get this shit?"

"Apparently not," he murmurs, loving her ridiculously, because there just isn't anybody but Tasha who would think all this was obvious.

"Jesus, people are morons," she mutters darkly. "Whatever. What's it going to take to get you to stop worrying about this, Barton? Because you're pissing me off."

"Hell, Tasha. I don't know. Maybe…" he squirms, because despite the fact that she's kept threatening to watch, and the thought of it really kind of does it for him, he's a little worried that the reality of it might make her look at him differently, make her unable to feel right about letting him top her anymore, that seeing him so completely owned by Phil could spoil her occasional need to let Natalia out to play. He doesn't want to spoil any of those things, because submitting to Phil by no means erases his desire for those things as well. He likes being a Switch, is truly comfortable in both roles, and is even honest enough with himself to admit that if Tasha did require a deeper level of submission than she does, he'd be okay with that. Those are all things he loves, and will not risk. Even though this…with Phil…he thinks this is something he _needs._ This doesn't release stress or provide a healthy outlet for aggression or allow him to set aside his superspy assassin persona and step into other shoes for a while. This…this _heals _him. But he also understands that Natasha is also starting to get really frustrated with him, and that if he's going to let both relationships work, he's going to have to find a way to share this one with her, because it's not insecurity that's making him worry, it's that it doesn't feel right NOT to share it with her. She's part of him. "Maybe I need to see you…well, _seeing_ it, and if you're really okay with it, I can stop acting fucked up about it."

"We can try that, sure. It's going to be a little longer than I'd anticipated though. After the conference, Director Fury's been asked to meet with some South Korean intelligence officers about some data they've intercepted on….well. Some data they've intercepted. I'll accompany him as his secretary to watch his back, just in case the people they intercepted it FROM have gotten wind."

He feels his heart sink a little at this. It's been nearly a week, and he'd been looking forward to being back in New York, and her. She encourages him to stay a little longer in San Francisco, and he agrees, because if he goes back to New York not knowing when she'll be back, he'll just worry about it. He's not stupid. Tasha has higher security clearance than he does, but any meeting with South Korean intelligence has something to do with North Korea, and those fuckers are crazy. Who the hell plays chicken with the rest of the world with nuclear warheads just to prove they've got the sack for it?

And then there is the third headspace, the one in which he is an odd mix of himself…and himself at anywhere from about twelve to about seventeen, depending on the circumstances. When they go out for ice cream or sit on Phil's bed and play video games, it's closer to twelve. When Phil punishes him for being a brat (which is often, because it's too much fucking fun to stop), he's older, past where he lost his virginity and no longer innocent, because it arouses him horribly, and though he's still "little boy," he's not actually a LITTLE boy. When Phil fucks him while he's in that headspace, he's still young, but no longer any kind of a child. And at all of those times, a big part of him also remains himself. He realizes that would all probably sound weird to anyone else, and confuse the hell out of most people, but it works for him. Oh god, it fucking works for him. Since it apparently really works for Phil too, he's not going to dissect it. Not everything has to be analyzed to death.

Phil, utterly unsurprisingly, notices that he seems preoccupied. When he asks about it, Clint's not even able to think about lying, or downplaying his inner conflict. Early on in their relationship as asset and handler, Phil had looked penetratingly into his eyes and told him that he understood that there would be stuff he couldn't or wouldn't be able to tell Phil, but that it was crucial to his being able to give Clint what he needed for Clint to never lie to him, even when the truth was difficult or embarrassing. He had promised never to ask for anything Hawkeye couldn't give him, but would expect Hawkeye to give Phil everything he did ask for. He had, of course, been referring to answers, mainly about Clint's own physical and mental state before, during and after a mission, but Clint recalls that he'd read a little double entendre into the remark at the time, and had smirked about it, but now that he's really able to be truthful about how he feels towards Phil, he can remember the tiny secret thrill the words had given him. It was pretty soon after that the dream had started. The one where Phil didn't ask for more than Clint could give him. But it was close. So he confesses his trepidations about Natasha, and Phil listens to him wind himself up over it for close to half an hour. Finally he stops the archer with two fingers on his lips, which is incredibly effective, because every time he feels any part of Phil's skin on any part of his, he forgets how to talk.

"Trust me," says Phil. "Trust her, and trust yourself. Do you really think Agent Romanov and I haven't been in contact throughout this visit?"

"Oh," says Clint, but his body's already relaxing anyway, because when Phil says Trust Me, Clint obeys him.

Four days later, Phil tells him in the morning that he has a surprise for him that evening. He's careful to make very sure Clint gets the message that the surprise is for _him_ and not the kind of surprise one promises a child. Phil has meetings all day. He hands Clint a datapad when he leaves, after a short but hungry kiss that leaves Clint breathless, and orders him firmly to do his homework.

Intrigued, Clint fires up the pad and opens the file by tapping the screen. It's a list of instructions. It is painstakingly detailed, and quite long. For some reason, it gives him a vicarious thrill of anticipation. It tells him what to eat (plenty of protein, healthy carbs, nothing on the list that might cause any kind of crash or bloat or indigestion, really the kinds of things he eats before a long stakeout. It details a list of katas and exercises he is to do at various times during the day. They will leave him centered, relaxed, his muscles warm and loose. It tells him how to wash, what products to use on his hair, his face when he shaves, his skin. Clint never uses moisturizer. He's not a fussy person, and any kind of personal odor could give him away on an op. He wears cologne sometimes when he dresses up a little, but half the time he just washes his hair with a bar of soap. Personal grooming for him is a necessity, nothing more. Not today. Today he is meticulous, and follows Phil's instructions to the letter. The explanation note beside the moisturizer item on the list explains that it will make his skin better able to tolerate the lash. Clint rolls the phrase around in his mouth as his hands smooth the indicated product into his skin, warm and damp from his shower, and his dick is more than half hard. "Tolerate the lash." He huffs out a small laugh. Phil's so eloquent sometimes, almost old-fashioned in the way he speaks. It makes the filth he spouts that much more titillating. He cleans himself, inside and out (flushed and embarrassed and really glad he's alone for some of it) and clips and files his fingernails. When it's almost time for Phil to be home, he dresses himself as instructed, in clothing, Phil has ordered, he does not mind having ruined. His pulse is elevated, his breath tight and hot in his chest, his stomach in knots, when he hears the locks on the door click, and then Phil is home. Unsure of what he's supposed to do, he starts to go to his knees, but Phil stops him, makes him stand in the center of the living room floor while he walks in a slow circle around Clint, inspecting him. His fingertips brush Clint's skin, his hair. He takes Clint's hands, one at a time, inspecting his fingernails. He strokes gently over cheek and chin to check for stubble, appraises the clothing Clint has chosen (worn jeans, an older t-shirt, shoes he can kick off with no socks, no underwear) and nods.

"You're a good boy, Clint," he says softly, his voice warm with an approval that makes the archer's toes curl. Everything he has done today has served to dump him most of the way into headspace already. He sinks gracefully to his knees, and this time, Phil doesn't stop him. "Give me your wrists," he orders with a smile, and Clint raises them, palms up, hands in loose fists, pressed loosely together. Phil reaches into his pocket and takes out his set of leather cuffs. He buckles them in place, while Clint closes his eyes and sighs contentedly. Phil makes him stand, and he raises one foot and then the other when directed, balancing easily on the other for as long as Phil takes to attach the ankle cuffs. He's glad he chose not to wear socks. Without a word, Phil turns and goes to the door. Clint starts to follow, out of habit, but hesitates. He stands where Phil put him, because Phil hasn't actually told him to follow. At the door, Phil turns back to him, and the warm flash of approval in his mild blue eyes fills Hawkeye with pleasure.

"Come with me," says Phil finally, and Clint is at his side in an instant. They ride the elevator to the parking garage in silence. Clint is dying to ask where they are going as Phil ushers him into his car. It's his personal vehicle, not his black SHIELD sedan that screams government vehicle by its very unremarkable sameness. Clint knows Phil owns a two-seater Cobra, in which they have sped down the coast with the wind in their hair, but tonight he's driving his everyday car, a midsize Chevy sedan of no particular notice. On the outside, anyway. Under the hood, a big block 454 is hidden, balanced and blueprinted, and Clint knows very well the unremarkable-looking family four-door can fucking scream. Phil's work has made him a target before and probably will again, so most of the time he elects to have the vehicle he drives be one which will call no attention to itself. But if he is followed or needs to follow someone, it's too bad for them. The sedan is faster than the cobra. He bites his lip and squirms a little in his seat, but refuses to give in to his impulse to ask. He sees Phil eyeing him with an amused little smile and smiles back, a little nervously.

"I'm very glad we've had this time together, Clint," he says warmly, reaching over and giving one of the younger man's hands a gentle squeeze.

"So am I, Sir," says Clint. "Thank you Sir." He sees the white flash of Phil's teeth as his smile widens in the dark cabin of the car. The sun has long since set. Phil almost never gets off work before dark.

"You're hating this, aren't you?" he asks, humor in his voice.

"If this were an op, I would be, Sir," he answers. "You trained me yourself to trust my instincts and never follow blindly, and to get as much information up front as possible."

"And what do your instincts tell you now?"

"That I'd love to know where we're going, but I'd follow you anywhere, Sir, no matter where it is."

Phil makes a sound in his throat that is enormously pleased.

"What a marvelous answer," he says softly.

They drive in silence for almost an hour, finally entering a neighborhood that is more industrial than residential, and is quite close to the waterfront. Clint admires the big, old brick warehouses, dating from not long after San Francisco was settled and became a shipping center. He loves old buildings. They always have tons of vantage points for someone like him. For a second, his fingers itch for his bow, but he smooths them on the rough denim on his thighs and breathes in and out, slow and easy. They pull into one of the warehouses and Phil turns the car off. He gets out, and there is a longish pause as Phil pulls the huge old wooden doors closed, and latches them. Clint expects an almighty creaking and squealing of rusty hinges, but the doors are well-oiled and almost silent. He stays in his seat, for Phil has not instructed him to get out. The trunk opens and then closes with a thunk, and Phil is opening his door and holding his hand down for Clint to take. Phil has a black duffel bag over his shoulder. He stands up and follows Phil deeper into the big warehouse. Phil's shoes make faint tocking sounds on the stone floor, with their leather soles, but Clint's Vans are silent. Before they have reached the back wall of the warehouse (Clint is very good with spatial awareness and can tell they haven't taken enough steps), the come to a wall with a single door in it. Phil takes out a key.

On the other side of the door there is a space that makes Clint's steps falter a little. The floor is still concrete, but here it is painted a deep cobalt blue, and dotted with thick rugs. The walls, obviously newer than the rest of the building, are black. A large sofa and a couple of chairs form a sitting area around a wide, short coffee table at one end of the room. Tiny pinpoint track lights and a handful of candles offer a gentle, subdued lighting, and it is the rest of what's in the room that makes Clint nearly trip over his own feet. Dotted about the room are sturdy apparatus, with each piece of which he is at least somewhat familiar. A black-painted, heavy, padded sawhorse with extra bits added for knees and elbows to rest upon is situated not far from the couch. There is a huge iron cage big enough for a man to stand in, as long as the man isn't Thor, tucked into a corner. He sees a St. Andrew's Cross and a set of stocks. There is a padded bar hanging from chains in the ceiling. It has o-rings screwed into it in several places, six of them, enabling both the chains suspending it and the arms or ankles of the person attached to it to be positioned as desired. Sunk into the floor directly under the bar are two more pairs of o-rings, each with a length of chain attached to it. He shudders. It's the bar to which Phil leads him. He stops under it, and moves to stand in front of Clint.

"Do you trust me, beautiful boy?" he asks softly, and his eyes are luminous in the glow cast by the flickering glow of the candles on a short table nearby.

"Yes Master," breathes Clint, his whole body already starting to soften and relax. This is so awesome he can't even express it. He's been to dungeons before, in various cities around the world, when he had R&R time and was alone (the ones in Amsterdam are really something to see), but not usually private ones. He wonders who this place belongs to, but not strongly enough to ask. It's perfect, and that's all that matters. Phil closes his eyes for a second when Clint uses the title. Clint knows he likes the sound of it. He's also familiar enough with the protocols of the lifestyle to know (and knows that Phil is too) that it is acceptable for him to call Phil this if he feels Phil has earned that much respect from him, without it actually having to mean that Phil is HIS Master. It is an honorific. With a collar, it becomes a title.

Phil goes to the wall and operates a pulley there, which lowers the bar a little so that it is about a foot above his head. This will lift his arms but not put any strain on them. Phil takes carabiners out of his pocket and one at a time, lifts and fastens Clint's leather cuffs to the bar. He taps Clint's feet and slides his shoes off when he raises them obediently. There's one of the soft rugs under his feet, between the floor bolts, so that his feet will not get cold. He doesn't attach the ankle cuffs to the floor yet. Phil taps the insides of his thighs until he spreads them slightly, so that his feet are securely planted a little more the shoulder length apart.

"Pull-up," orders Phil. "I want to make sure it can take your weight.

Hawkeye lifts his hands (there's a little slack where his wrist cuffs are attached and he has leeway to let them hang, or to grasp the chains suspending the bar, or to grip the bar itself. He takes hold of it and pulls himself easily off the floor. He can do as many pull ups as Phil wants. One handed, if the handler would like. The bar is securely anchored and takes his weight easily. He pulls himself up further, straightening his arms, until his upper body is above the bar, elbows locked. Partly he's making sure he trusts the apparatus, but partly he knows he's showing off too. Phil's mouth twitches, but he nods at Clint to do as he likes, and crosses his arms to watch. His gaze is appreciative. Clint bends at the waist and slowly pulls the lower half of his body up behind him, bending his knees and tucking his head down as he rolls himself halfway over, then extending his legs at the top of the arch, freezing into a handstand. He can't hold it long, because the bar isn't anchored to anything, and sways a little, like a trapeze. He lowers himself slowly to the floor, Phil is standing in front of him.

"I think it will do," he says mildly, and Clint ducks his head with an aw-shucks sort of grin. Phil just looks into his eyes for a few seconds, which Clint returns, because Phil finds it silly to require him to avert his eyes. ("How can you catch any of the signals I may want or need to send your way if you're always staring at the floor?" Which is logic, for they are still SHIELD operatives even if they're lovers, and the world is still a dangerous place). All his life, Clint has struggled with a tendency to be unable to stand still, but he's mastered the urge as a sniper, and so he sublimates the instinct to fidget while Phil looks at him. Finally, Phil leans forward and kisses his softly on the mouth. Clint whimpers softly, and leans into the kiss, but Phil holds him back. "What is your safeword?" he asks.

"Red, Sir." Phil asks him this every time they embark on a scene wherein there is any potential for pain or distress or physical issues such as loss of circulation. Clint knows Phil doesn't think he'd forget the word. It is simply one of the rules, the protocols of negotiating a scene. Were they strangers, or only acquaintances, they would negotiate a lot more. Hard and soft limits – things you will not or do not like to do or have done to you, sharing of any known medical issues such as a heart condition or asthma, what implements will be used – all are part of the open discussion that should go into the preface of a safe and consensual scene. Clint and Phil have known each other for years, and the negotiations happened the day after Clint had broken into Phil's New York apartments and thrown himself upon Phil's mercy. Phil, thank all the gods there are, doesn't have a lot of mercy.

"Good boy," says Phil. He reaches up and seizes the neck of Clint's t-shirt in both fists, shredding it from his body with a swift yank down and out. Clint gasps at the sudden cooler air on his back and chest, and lust pools in his belly at Phil tearing his clothes off. Phil slowly draws a knife from his pocket, opening it with his thumb and letting Clint see it. He kneels suddenly and Clint feels a tug at the cuff of his jeans, then the cold steel of the back of the blade against his ankle. Phil runs the knife up his leg, cutting through the denim with a rasping sound. He is quick and efficient, and whenever Clint shudders too hard at the heady sensation of the steel gliding along his skin, Phil pauses and waits for him to be still. When his jeans are in tatters, Phil finally cuffs his ankles to the floor, leaving some slack in the chains. Clint returns his feet as precisely as he can to the position Phil had placed them in earlier. Phil stands, nodding in satisfaction, and because Clint is reacting strongly to the knife, he spends a few minutes trailing it along Clint's body, up and down his arms, along his collar bone, down his chest and belly, stopping short of his stiff cock, which has been achingly hard from the moment he walked in this door. Clint shivers and sighs and whimpers a little at the sensation. Phil presses the tip of the knife into his left nipple, slowly exerting pressure but not quite breaking skin. Clint is panting slightly when he stops, turns, and goes to the bag he has left on the table nearby. He zips it open and takes out a flogger. Clint's belly clenches when he sees it's made of stiff, shiny latigo leather. He thinks he sees a dozen falls. Latigo is stiffer than other leathers, and its impact against flesh is sharp and biting. Secretly, Clint is pleased, though he knows a lot of people find latigo too intense. He likes floggers, but most of the common leathers (standard cow suede, deer skin, elk hide, buffalo) feel pretty much like a deep tissue massage to him, or at worst an intense sparring match. He likes the bite of things that sting. He's been punched too many times to find heavy thud as arousing. He's unable to stop himself from squirming and making eager sounds in his throat at Phil stalks towards him with the implement he's chosen. Phil's hand strokes down his arms, trails fingertips down his throat, brushes around to his shoulders and down his back. He closes his eyes as the gentle establishing of a link between them that Phil is creating with his touch sends him even deeper into headspace.

The latigo flogger bites into his back and shoulders like dozens of tiny bee-stings. Clint drops his head forward to keep his neck out of the way and groans as the bite sings through his body. By the time his back is on fire, he is floating in a sea of sensation and ecstasy. He's aware that it hurts, and he gasps or moans or cries out when Phil puts his back into a stroke, but the endorphins released by the pain combined with how deeply he'd already dropped before they even got here combine to send him almost immediately into orbit. He isn't spaced out though, oh no. He's acutely aware of every move Phil makes, of this flare of heat when the latigo bites down, of the scent of beeswax and leather, the creak of his cuffs.

"Oh God. Phil," he whimpers, but not in pain. Phil's answer is to drop the whip lower and paint Clint's ass with heat. He hisses and moans and arcs his body towards Phil. "Yessss," he sighs. "More. Please Sir."

"God, you're a pain slut," growls Phil with approval as he muscles the flogger into Clint's flesh with vicious force. Clint can only groan in agreement.

Phil uses the flogger on him until Clint's body is sheened with sweat and his upper back and naked buttocks are covered with bee-sting sized welts and his skin is deep red and blazingly hot to the touch. He then switches the flogger out for his kangaroo hide signal whip, a four-foot long single tail made of 12-plait brown hide. It's similar to the one Natasha had used on him in the dojo, but is shorter and lighter than that one. Phil paints his body with welts, but doesn't break skin, while he vocalizes mindless breathy cries and whimpers and mewls of need and pleasure, for he's consumed with the thought that it is PHIL doing this to him, Phil giving him this pain, this heady and devastating whipping. He feels so _alive_ as his body overloads on sensation.

"Jesus, that's fucking hot."

The voice startles him about halfway out of headspace, because he'd only mistake Tasha's voice if he were deaf. She steps from the shadows, stalking and slinking towards him in fuck-me spike-heeled boots that are buckled with a dozen tiny silver buckles up her calves and over the tops of her knees nearly to mid-thigh. Her skin tight black mini dress barely covers her crotch, and her small waist is nipped in even more with a black leather corset that lifts and accentuates her lush breasts and emphasizes the womanly curve of her hips, which sway as she approaches.

"T…Tasha?" he gasps, because his brain is too clouded for him to think of anything else to say, and he's dropped too deeply to pull himself all the way out, even if he's startled by her appearance. She doesn't say another word, but goes to her knees in front of him, taking his erection deeply into her mouth with a deep, smooth swallow, her throat muscles working around him. Tasha has practically no gag reflex at all. His head drops back forward as he moans in an agony of desire. He feels Phil behind him, and his head is yanked back by his hair.

"God!" he cries desperately when Phis leans in close.

"Don't you dare come, little boy," growls Coulson, then shoves his head back forward with a rough caress as he releases his grip.

"Ohhhh fuck," sighs Clint, hoping desperately that he is able to obey. The whipping continues, and before he's really even had time to process the fact that Tasha is HERE and has been watching them the whole time and get freaked out about it, he's deep under again, drowning in the drugging combination of Phil's whip and Natasha's mouth, both tormenting and thrilling him in equal measure. He has no idea how much time passes, but finds he's able to hold back the orgasm wanting to build in his balls and burst down Tasha's throat by focusing on the whip. At length, she pulls away from him with a small gasp as she takes a deep breath, and he whines as the air cools her saliva on his starving cock.

"Goddamn, Coulson," she says breathlessly. "I knew I wanted to see this, but I didn't know it would be this fucking hot. I can't wait. You're an artist." She's looking over Clint's shoulder at Phil as she speaks, and Clint hears Phil chuckle, is aware that the whip stops, then Tasha turns her bright, sharp gaze on him. Her fingers slide through his hair and she tugs his head up to devour his mouth with hers, sucking and biting at his lips and tongue. He whimpers and groans into her mouth, and she pulls back, gasping.

"Jesus, Barton," she pants. "You're so fucking gorgeous like this. I could lick up every inch of you like ice cream. I'm having you now."

With that, she reaches up to grasp the bar, and pulls herself up, her legs going around his hips. She's not wearing panties, and she rolls her hips until her entrance, slick with heat, slides over the head of his cock and she sinks down, taking him deep. She snarls when he cries out at the sensation of her hot, tight little pussy clenched around every inch of his quivering, desperate cock, and leans in to sink her perfect small teeth into the side of his throat. His cry turns into a frantic, wordless plea when he feels Phil's fingers, slick with lubricant, slide between his asscheeks and into him. Phil's been very…thorough….the last week and a half. What's happening now makes the reason that Phil hasn't fucked him the last couple of days suddenly become clear. He is still pretty sore, but without the regular use of his hole by Phil's fingers and cock, he has recovered a little, but also tightened back up a lot. Phil pushes two fingers in roughly, and Clint mewls at the sudden stretch.

"How does it feel, Clint," hisses Tasha into his ear. "In just a minute, we'll both be fucking you."

"Jesus Tasha," he gasps, almost a sob as the ache inside him rearranges around Phil's fingers. A shrill whine sings in his throat when Phil scissors his fingers apart, opening him. "Oh shit, oh fuck, oh goddamn," he pants. "Sir! Master! Please!" He knows what he's saying to Phil, but far from being perturbed, Tasha's riding his cock like she's starving and he's Death by Chocolate, biting and sucking at his throat and collarbone while she pants and curses softly in Russian.

"Language, Natasha," says Phil in mock outrage, because he speaks flawless Russian too, and Tasha has just said, "Come on, you motherfucking sick cocksucking son of a whore, fuck him. Fuck him now, hurry the fuck up you bastard." She groans at Phil's words and Clint feels her pussy clench hard on his dick. He's rocking his hips in time with her thrusts, and it rocks his hole back and forth on Phil's fingers as he opens him up.

"Ohhhh," he whimpers, and hisses in pain when Phil pulls his fingers farther apart.

"Something to say, boy?" purrs Coulson in his ear.

"Hhhurttttsss," whines Clint.

"It's going to hurt more in about ten seconds, baby," promises Phil, which makes him shudder and Tasha gasps. Then Phil's fingers are gone, and Clint hears him unfasten his belt buckle and slide the zipper on his pants down.

"Pleasepleasepleaseplease," he's panting, though he has no idea what he's begging for. His voice rises higher in panic and need when he feels the blunt hardness of Phil's cock nudge between his cheeks and press at his entrance. Phil pushes into him with one deep, slow stroke, his hands on Clint's hips right above the leather of Tasha's boots. "Ohhhgod," he cries. "Oh…._nngh_….I can't…._hnn…._Phil…_ohfuckfuck…_it hurts, Sir, please!"

Phil and Tasha growl at almost exactly the same time, and Phil pulls almost all the way out and then back in, harder than the first time. The pain isn't anything like being torn or forced open too suddenly, because Phil has prepped him well, it is instead the deep ache of having been used repeatedly and thoroughly so many times when he is unaccustomed to the frequency. That, and Phil has bent him over, howling and begging for mercy, and used him roughly to punish him once more since the first time. His asshole is a throbbing ache around Phil's pistoning cock. Underneath the ache, heat like melted chocolate pools in his belly and deeper, down into his balls and crawling up his spine. He feels like he's drowning in sensation as Tasha's hot, wet pussy milks his cock and Phil's erection slides over the perfect spot with every brutal thrust. His eyes roll back in his skull, and his whole body trembles. He knows on a merely peripheral level that he's panting and whimpering and begging mindlessly. Tasha kisses him, and swallows his frantic cries and mindless babble as she whispers back to him between deep, drugging kisses.

"Christ, Barton. You're fucking amazing like this. It's the hottest thing I've ever seen." He feels her stretch her body a little, which lifts her nearly off his straining cock, which makes him want to promise her anything if she'll just keep fucking him, but he's aware she's looking over his shoulder at what Phil's doing, that she's watching Phil's cock fucking into him, and his knees nearly buckle at her throaty moan of approval. "Oh Jesus, oh fuck," she groans appreciatively. "I'm watching him fuck you, Clint. Shit that's…_ungh…_that's hot. Does it hurt?"

"Y….yessss," he gasps, and feels her shiver.

"God, Clint," she gasps back, sinking hard back onto him and rocking her hips hard against him, grinding down onto him, her body undulating and writhing against him, limber as a snake. He feels the walls of her pussy start to quiver, feels her turn her head a little to gaze at Phil, glassy-eyed and needy. "Phil," she snarls, "Harder. Hurry…I'm…._ahh_…just…_hurry!_"

Phil growls in response, shifting his hold so that he grasps Natasha's ankles where she has them wrapped around Clint's hips, yanking her forwards towards him as he shoves brutally with his hips. This forces Natasha down harder onto Clint's cock _and_ forces Clint's hole down harder on his own. All three of them utter breathless cries at the sensation. Clint feels his balls draw tight, tingling, as Natasha's orgasm begins, her cunt rippling around him as Phil yanks her towards him again, then clamping down hard while she buries her teeth in the archer's shoulder and screams, writhing against him.

"Master," he cries, frantic, because he doesn't think he can hold it, he really doesn't. "Please…._ohgod…._I'm…I need….MASTER! PHIL! PLEASE!"

"Come for us," snarls Phil in his ear, slamming his hips into Clint's ass, the rhythm of his thrusts faltering as his own pleasure swamps him. His hands release Tasha's ankles and reach around Clint's pectoral muscles to pull him snugly up against himself. Clint's head falls back onto Phil's shoulder and he shouts hoarsely as a shattering orgasm rolls over and through him like a tidal wave, blotting out everything but the blinding, searing, exquisite release. The matching clutch and throb of Natasha and Phil surrounding and violating him drags the pleasure out like hot taffy, sweet and going on and on and on before it finally thins down and snaps, leaving him shaking and panting and struggling to force enough air into his lungs. It is only the fact that his hands are locked onto the bar and Phil is propping both of them up that keeps him from buckling and hanging deadweight from his wrists. Natasha lies boneless, still plastered to the front of his body.

"All right, beautiful boy?" whispers Phil in his ear.

"Nnguh," is the best he can manage, which makes Natasha laugh. The reflexive clenching this causes inside her, still surrounding his slowly softening and acutely sensitive dick reminds him how to speak. "Oh _fuck_, Tash! Don't do that, you're killing me!" This only makes her laugh harder, which wrenches an agonized groan from the depths of his soul, so she extricates herself and, staggering a little, goes to the table holding the bag, where she retrieves some Kleenex, returning to help clean them all up a little.

"The question still remains," Phil reminds him, as he eases out of Clint's melting body, wringing whimpers from the archer's throat.

"Ahhh….guh! I…hnng…stand by my answer, Sir," he gasps, and Phil chuckles.

"Am I to assume that 'nnguh' is an affirmative answer?"

"Jesus Christ," mumbles Clint feelingly. "It's going into the dictionary under awesome Sir."

Together, Phil and Natasha set about releasing him from the bar and floor. They lower him slowly to his knees, gently chafing his hands and arms in case they've gone to sleep (his hands have, a little, because he's been squeezing the bar so hard.) He stays where they put him, head hanging down, floating dreamily as they support him gently, front and back. He has never felt so warm and protected and content in his life. He has no idea how much time passes in this blissed out state, but eventually Natasha says his name, and he looks at her, clear-eyed but smiling a slightly goofy smile.

"You all here with me now, Barton?" she asks, searching penetratingly into his eyes.

"Yeah," he says happily. "I'm good."

"Okay," she says with a nod. "I wanted to be sure first."

First? What does that mean? She can't be intending to do anything else to him, cause stick a fork in him, he's done. She picks up a black velvet box, about eight inches long and three inches wide, from the floor by her right knee. She must have fetched it from the bag, as it wasn't there before. It's the kind of box jewelry comes in. She opens it, and places it on the palms of her hands, holding it out to him. Inside, curled atop dark blue satin, is an exquisitely gorgeous silver chain. It is about as big around as a pencil, made of smooth serpentine links so perfectly joined that it almost seems to be a single piece of solid but flexible silver. The way the sections fit together form a faint pattern, so perfect that the design seems etched into it as opposed to being made up of links. The pattern looks like a repeating series of vaguely tribal or Celtic knotwork. In the center, the sinuous chain comes together, joined by two stylized finials which are shaped much like raptors' heads, and there is a ring through their curved beaks, joining them together. Dangling from the ring, there is a simple disk, inlaid with two crossed arrows, which are made of some kind of rich blue stone. Clint doesn't know a great deal about gemstones, but it looks like that stuff they used a lot in ancient Egypt. Lapis whatever. Glancing to make sure he's looking, Natasha gently turns the medallion over. Engraved on the back is one word. "Phil's."

His mouth goes dry.

"It's my understanding that most people don't know how this is really supposed to work, but I had an expert consultant," she says, flashing a smile over Clint's shoulder, Coulson's brief chuckle is soundless, but Clint feels it vibrate through his suddenly trembling body. "People think it's the Dominant's choice to offer this to their chosen submissive, but if you're really going to do it right, the submissive should actually beg for it from the Dom. Isn't that right?"

"I…yes," he says hoarsely, feeling light-headed. "But…Tasha…"

She pulls him to his feet, looking solemn. He senses Phil rising also, feels a faint sense of loss as Coulson steps back from them a few feet. The older agent places a hand briefly on Natasha's shoulder.

"I'm going to give you two a bit of space to talk about this," he says quietly, and crosses the room to the seating area to sit in one of the oversized chairs.

"Tash," whispers Clint fiercely when Phil is mostly out of earshot. "Do you have any idea what you're doing? Jesus!"

She rolls her eyes at him as if this were a particularly stupid question, which ok, it is a little. Tasha always knows what she's doing.

"I'm giving you your collar so you can beg Phil to put it on you, if you want it," she says patiently, as though speaking to a particularly clueless child.

"Do you have any idea what that means?" he asks incredulously.

"Of course. It means you belong to him."

"I can't belong to him! I'm in a relationship with you!"

"Clint, Phil and I have already talked about this. Our claims on your body and your heart aren't mutually exclusive. You have an enormous capacity to give to the people you love, and there is more than enough of that to share. Phil won't step on my toes, and I won't step on his. My claim on your time takes precedence, which might seem on the surface to contradict the concept of having a Master, but think about it. You and I will be working and living in the same place most of the time. Therefore, granting my relationship with you precedence doesn't get in the way of your collar, because it's just going to happen that way anyway. Phil is a busy man. It wouldn't be fair of him to collar you if he was the only person in your life, because it's my understanding that owning someone requires a pretty consistent time commitment. Right?"

"Right," Clint agrees thoughtfully, though he's trembling harder than ever because what she's saying makes entirely too much sense, and he's trying to prevent a wild, yearning hope from blossoming inside him.

"And he can't give you that, not even if you moved out here to be with him."

"No, he couldn't."

"This collar doesn't have a normal clasp," she continues, turning it over to show him a tiny keyhole in the back of the medallion, above the engraving. "Phil is going to give me the key to hold, not because he's giving me any power over you. I won't do that. Be sure of that. It's to show that he trusts me with it, and so that the collar will never come between you and me, I have the power to take it off when we need it to be out of the picture, though we did make sure to choose a design you can pretty much wear all the time without it being obvious what it means."

"Y…you and Phil chose this…together?"

"Yes," she says softly. "He wanted it that way, wanted you to know that it was something he and I chose for you together…not just the piece of jewelry, but the choice of offering it to you. And I wanted to be the one to give it to you, because I want you to know that I want you to have it. Most of the time when you're able to be with Phil, it will be when I'm busy. I'm really good at undercover work and at working with Fury, so I'm going to keep having more assignments than the rest of the Avengers most of the time. That means I won't step on Phil's ownership of you when you're with him. Well, except when we do stuff like tonight because I really, really hope we will. It was fucking amazing."

"Pretty amazing for me too," says Clint, a little dazed, and unable to take his eyes off the gorgeous collar. His lifts a trembling hand, fingertips longing to touch it, see if it's real. "Tasha," he says breathlessly, "are you sure?"

"Yes," she says simply, and there is nothing but truth in her eyes. "Take your collar from me, Clint. I'm giving it to you with my blessing. It's my gift to you, for being the best goddamn thing that's ever happened to me. And you know I hate this sappy shit, so go beg your Master to put it on you before my brain starts to bleed."

Though he is naked, he steps to her, sliding his hands through the ruby silk strands of her hair. He fists his hands in it and pulls her to him, kissing her deeply, gratefully, hungrily. She'd hate it if he added more sap to what has already started to make her twitchy, so he just kisses her, hard and long, with lips and teeth and tongues, then he takes the box from her and crosses the room to where Phil sits waiting. Phil is motionless in the chair, with every outward appearance of relaxation, but Clint sees the fine trembling in his hand where it rest on his knee, mirroring the trembling in Clint's own body. He sinks to his knees in front of Phil's chair, letting the box rest on his lap and bowing his head. Quietly, he waits. There is a long pause during which he begins to wonder if he's doing this right, but finally he feels a gentle tap on his shoulder that is Phil giving him permission to speak. He's never done this before, only seen and heard about it. He's so nervous he could die, and is desperately afraid he's going to say something monumentally dumb. He draws a deep, shuddering breath and looks up at Phil though his eyelashes, feeling very shy and uncertain. It's up to him to do this though, so he just dives the hell in like he does most everything else.

"Wh…ah," he clears his throat when he finds it hard to speak. "When Tasha sent me to you that first night," he begins, falteringly, "I didn't have any idea what to expect. I knew I wanted you, that I had dreamed about being with you for a really long time. In…um…in my dream, you acted just a little bit like the sort of lover I hardly dared to hope you'd be. I think even my own subconscious didn't dare hope you'd want to be more than that, more than the little bit rough and forceful you were in the dream. I couldn't believe it when you turned out to want all the same things I wanted, but would probably never have been brave enough to tell you. I considered myself fortunate to have found a taste of It with Tasha. I…well, I expected not much more than a one-night stand with you, hoping it would fulfill my curiosity and then we could both move on from it, hopefully not disappointed."

"I certainly wasn't disappointed," says Phil with gentle humor.

"Me either," agrees Clint fervently. "You…Phil…you're everything I needed and couldn't express. You are exactly as forceful and brutal and kind and gentle as I need you to be. You take all the last little bits of baggage I had hidden away too far down to be reached and you make me clean and safe and whole. Making….making you happy, pleasing you, serving you….that makes me so happy I can't imagine ever not doing it anymore. Phil….Sir….._Master…_" he says, breathless and terrified. "Please, please Sir, please will you allow me to wear your collar?" He squeezes his eyes tight shut while he begs at the last, afraid to see the look on Phil's face. The box is lifted from his nerveless fingers, and suddenly Phil is on his knees too, facing him. He opens his eyes and dares to look anxiously at the handler's face. Phil's expression is reverent, a little awed, and luminous with happiness.

"Clint, my beautiful boy," he whispers feelingly. "I would be honored."

He takes a key from his pocket, a tiny silver key no longer than Natasha's pinkie fingernail, and unlocks the medallion. Clint bows his head forward, offering his neck to Phil, and his throat clogs with emotion. His eyes prickle with tears, and he knows he's smiling like an idiot, but he doesn't care. Phil must grasp the chain in his hands for a while first, because it feels warm and alive when it slides around his neck. He sighs, deeply satisfied, when Phil runs the ring back through the hawks' beaks and turns the key in its tiny secret lock, binding the collar to his neck so that of his own accord he cannot remove it. He knows his eyes are shining when he looks at Phil. Phil's eyes shine back. The medallion rests in the hollow of his throat, in exactly the perfect spot. It is exactly the right thing, so beautiful that no one would ever question why he doesn't take it off. And he doesn't plan to, unless it's truly necessary. Phil leans in and kisses him, reverently, passionately, and Clint kisses him back, making small eager sounds in the back of his throat. Phil pulls back, and his strong, square fingertips touch the pendant and rub gently along the smooth serpentine of the heavy chain.

"Mine," he whispers with deep satisfaction. Clint sighs joyously at the sound of the word, and his response is one word also, but it is everything.

"Master."


End file.
